wrath
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
5 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "wrath", 5-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "wrath" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "wrath" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
wrath is aEnglishnoun. It means: Great anger; (countable) an instance of this. Pronounced /ɹɒθ/. Often confused with WTH and writ.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | wrath |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ɹɒθ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #11,328 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for wrath is 5 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɹɒθ/. Corpus data places it at rank #11,328 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 8 documented wrong-spelling variants for wrath, with forms such as "rwath", "warth", and "wraht". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "WTH", "writ", "Wray", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: The noun is derived from Middle English wraththe, wreththe (“anger, fury, rage; animosity, hostility; deadly sin of wrath; distress, vexation; punishment; retribution (?)”) [and other forms], from Old English wrǣþþu (“ire, wrath”) [and other forms], from Pr… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is wrath, spelled W-R-A-T-H, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Great anger; (countable) an instance of this.
- 2Punishment, retribution, or vengeance resulting from anger; (countable) an instance of this.
- 3Great ardour or passion.
Etymology
The noun is derived from Middle English wraththe, wreththe (“anger, fury, rage; animosity, hostility; deadly sin of wrath; distress, vexation; punishment; retribution (?)”) [and other forms], from Old English wrǣþþu (“ire, wrath”) [and other forms], from Proto-West Germanic *wraiþiþu (“anger, fury, wrath”), from *wraiþ (“angry, furious, wroth; hostile, violent; bent, twisted”) (from Proto-Germanic *wraiþaz (“angry, furious, wroth; hostile, violent; bent, twisted”), from Proto-Indo-European *wreyt- (“to twist”)) + *-iþu (suffix forming abstract nouns). Effectively analysable as wroth + -th (abstract nominal suffix). The verb is derived from Middle English wratthen (“to be or become angry, to rage; to quarrel; to cause wrath, offend; to become troubled or vexed; to cause grief or harm, grieve, vex”) [and other forms], from wraththe, wreththe (noun) (see above) + -en (suffix forming the infinitive of verbs). Cognates * Danish vrede (“anger, wrath”) * Dutch wreedte (“cruelty”) * Icelandic reiði (“anger”) * Swedish vrede (“anger, ire, wrath”)
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: rwath,warth,wraht,wrathh,wratth,wrrath,wrtah,wwrath
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for wrath
Misspelling Variants of "wrath"
Frequency rank: #11,328 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter W in our English index: