argentan

\aʁ.ʒɑ̃.tɑ̃\

/\aʁ.ʒɑ̃.tɑ̃\/ noun

The verdict

“argentan” is uncommon French (frequency #52,493 among 6,727 “A” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#52,493
frequency rank, French
6,727
“A” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Alliage de nickel et de cuivre ou de zinc, dit à tort argenton.

Corpus desk

Index FR-argentan · argentan · French

argentan · rank #52,493 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #52,493
  • LEN-LONG 8 letters
  • VOW-3 3 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,727
  • PHOTO-FINISH archipels

Nearest frequency peer: archipels (-1 rank slots)

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.

Rangs de longue queue près de « argentan »

Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court

corpus weight

What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « argentan » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for argentan
PropertyValue
Headwordargentan
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\aʁ.ʒɑ̃.tɑ̃\
Letters8
Frequency rank#52,493
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « argentan » en français

La fréquence va de la poignée de mots du quotidien (gauche) à la longue queue presque jamais vue (droite).argentantombe dans cette queue de rareté:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Voisins rares de la même bande: « archipels » (#52,492), « argentées » (#52,494), « arboriculture » (#52,491). Parmi 6,727 lemmes en « A », « argentan » est au #52,493. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

argentan is uncommon French at frequency #52,493 among 6,727 “A” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \aʁ.ʒɑ̃.tɑ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Alliage de nickel et de cuivre ou de zinc, dit à tort argenton.".

Zero misspellings are on record for argentan in our index, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.

Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is argentan, spelled A-R-G-E-N-T-A-N.

Definition

  1. 1
    Alliage de nickel et de cuivre ou de zinc, dit à tort argenton.

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

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

  1. Ouvrages en nickel allié au cuivre ou au zinc (argentan) : ce nickel contribue, dans des proportions qui varient beaucoup, à former, avec le cuivre et le zinc, des alliages désignés dans le commerce sous les noms d’argentan, melchior, maillechort, argent blanc, argent d’Allemagne ; l’argentan de belle qualité contient de 35 à 40 parties de nickel

Synonyms

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 French corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "argentan"?
"argentan" is spelled A-R-G-E-N-T-A-N. The IPA pronunciation is \aʁ.ʒɑ̃.tɑ̃\.
What does "argentan" mean?
As a noun, "argentan" means: Alliage de nickel et de cuivre ou de zinc, dit à tort argenton.
How do you pronounce "argentan"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "argentan" is \aʁ.ʒɑ̃.tɑ̃\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "argentan" come from?
"argentan" is a French word. PlainSpell covers definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German.
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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "argentan", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list