thole
/θəʊl/
"thole" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“thole” is uncommon English (frequency #99,935 among 3,151 “T” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #99,935
- frequency rank, English
- 3,151
- “T” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To suffer.
Corpus desk
Index EN-thole · thole · English
thole · rank #99,935 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #99,935
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,151
- PHOTO-FINISH thermography
Nearest frequency peer: thermography (-1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “thole”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Thatcherism
Thatcherism
69 corpus weight
- thermography
thermography
67 corpus weight
- thole
thole
66 corpus weight
- throating
throating
65 corpus weight
- thromboembo…
thromboembolism
64 corpus weight
- thymic
thymic
63 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “thole” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | thole |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /θəʊl/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #99,935 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “thole” in English
Rare enough to double-check
thole is uncommon English at frequency #99,935 among 3,151 “T” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed /θəʊl/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for thole in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English thōle, from tholen, tholien, from Old English þolian, from Proto-West Germanic *þolēn, from Proto-Germanic *þulāną (“to suffer”), from Proto-Indo-European *telh₂- (“to bear, suffer; to support”), compare Norwegian Bokmål tåle. The correct English form is thole, spelled T-H-O-L-E.
Definition
- 1To suffer.
- 2To endure, to put up with, to tolerate.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how thole appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Seventy beds keeps he there teeming mothers are wont that they lie for to thole and bring forth bairns hale so God’s angel to Mary quoth.
That remark of Edith Van Tromp's, to the effect that the illusions would all be swept away, had its confirmation before we had tholed through the first week of our island captivity.
Etymology
From Middle English thōle, from tholen, tholien, from Old English þolian, from Proto-West Germanic *þolēn, from Proto-Germanic *þulāną (“to suffer”), from Proto-Indo-European *telh₂- (“to bear, suffer; to support”), compare Norwegian Bokmål tåle.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "thole", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).