yield up the ghost

verb

"yield-up-the-ghost" is a 15-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“yield up the ghost” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
18
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - For a person, to die.

Corpus desk

Index EN-yield-up-the-ghost · yield up the ghost · English

yield up the ghost · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-MEGA 18 letters
  • VOW-6 6 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.

Key facts for yield up the ghost
PropertyValue
Headwordyield up the ghost
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechVerb
Letters18
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “yield up the ghost” sits in English frequency

yield up the ghost falls outside the top-100,000 ranked English words, the long-tail zone of technical, archaic, or low-frequency vocabulary, exactly where readers second-guess spellings most.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

yield up the ghost is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "For a person, to die.".

Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for yield up the ghost, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.

No documented word history exists for this headword, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct English form is yield up the ghost, spelled Y-I-E-L-D- -U-P- -T-H-E- -G-H-O-S-T.

Definition

  1. 1
    For a person, to die.

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

These source excerpts show how yield up the ghost appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. Then fell she down straightway at his feet, and yielded up the ghost: and the young men came in, and found her dead, and, carrying her forth, buried her by her husband.

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.

PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of September 3, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "yield up the ghost"?
"yield up the ghost" is spelled Y-I-E-L-D- -U-P- -T-H-E- -G-H-O-S-T.
What does "yield up the ghost" mean?
As a verb, "yield up the ghost" means: For a person, to die.
What language does "yield up the ghost" come from?
"yield up the ghost" is a English word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

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Data Source

Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list