yellowhammer
/ˈjɛl.əʊˌhæm.ə(ɹ)/
"yellowhammer" is a 12-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“yellowhammer” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 12
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A passerine bird, Emberiza citrinella, of western Eurasia, which is mainly yellow in colour.
Corpus desk
Index EN-yellowhammer · yellowhammer · English
yellowhammer · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 12 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "Y" 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 | yellowhammer |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈjɛl.əʊˌhæm.ə(ɹ)/ |
| Letters | 12 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “yellowhammer” in English
Rare enough to double-check
yellowhammer is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈjɛl.əʊˌhæm.ə(ɹ)/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for yellowhammer, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. Our dataset records no confusable match here, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: An alteration (influenced by hammer) of the earlier yelambre, yelamber, from Middle English *yelwambre, from yelwe (“yellow”) + *ambre (“yellowhammer”), from Old English amore, related to Old High German amaro (“yellowhammer”) (see modern German Ammer). The correct English form is yellowhammer, spelled Y-E-L-L-O-W-H-A-M-M-E-R.
Definition
- 1A passerine bird, Emberiza citrinella, of western Eurasia, which is mainly yellow in colour.
- 2The northern flicker, Colaptes auratus, a woodpecker with yellow underwings and undertail and often other yellowish underparts; one of its ways of feeding is to hammer on trees to find insects (adults and larvae) to eat.
- 3A native or resident of the American state of Alabama.
Etymology
An alteration (influenced by hammer) of the earlier yelambre, yelamber, from Middle English *yelwambre, from yelwe (“yellow”) + *ambre (“yellowhammer”), from Old English amore, related to Old High German amaro (“yellowhammer”) (see modern German Ammer).
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.