Tiresias
"tiresias" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Tiresias” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a proper noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A long-lived blind soothsayer who participated over seven generations in the legendary history of (the Greek city) Thebes, noted also for being transformed into a woman for seven years, so being sy...
Corpus desk
Index EN-tiresias · Tiresias · English
Tiresias · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "T" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Tiresias |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “Tiresias” in English
Rare enough to double-check
Tiresias is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as aproper noun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A long-lived blind soothsayer who participated over seven generations in the legendary history of (the Greek city) Thebes, noted also for being transformed into a woman for seven years, so being sy...".
No generated misspelling entries exist for Tiresias in our index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Ancient Greek Τειρεσίας (Teiresías). The correct English form is Tiresias, spelled T-I-R-E-S-I-A-S.
Definition
- 1A long-lived blind soothsayer who participated over seven generations in the legendary history of (the Greek city) Thebes, noted also for being transformed into a woman for seven years, so being symbolic of androgyny.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how Tiresias appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
[…]somewhere a ship's radio was blaring out the latest jazz-hit to reach Alexandria: Old Tiresias / No one half so breezy as, / Half so free and easy as / Old Tiresias.
The myth associated with how Tiresias became a hermaphrodite reveals much about relations between the sexes.
Etymology
Borrowed from Ancient Greek Τειρεσίας (Teiresías).
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.