babouin
\ba.bwɛ̃\
The verdict
“babouin” is uncommon French (frequency #53,150 among 227,490 “B” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #53,150
- frequency rank, French
- 227,490
- “B” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Espèce de singe de la sous-famille des cercopithécinés.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | babouin |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \ba.bwɛ̃\ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #53,150 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “babouin” sits in French frequency
Rare enough to double-check
babouin is uncommon French at frequency #53,150 among 227,490 “B” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ba.bwɛ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 7 senses are on record.
babouin has no tracked misspelling variants, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct French form is babouin, spelled B-A-B-O-U-I-N.
Definition
- 1Espèce de singe de la sous-famille des cercopithécinés.
- 2Personne considérée comme laide ou agissant de façon ridicule.
- 3Vieille personne considérée comme laide ou agissant de façon ridicule.
- 4Figure grotesque des corps-de-garde, que l'on faisait baiser aux soldats par punition ^([3]).
- 5Petit bouton qui vient aux lèvres après avoir bu dans un verre malpropre.
- 6Enfant ou jeune adulte étourdi, mal élevé ou qui suscite la honte.
- 7Lèvres, bouche ^([3]).
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); 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
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Using “babouin”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is B-A-B-O-U-I-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \ba.bwɛ̃\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Other uncommon French words near this rank
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.