bouvard
\bu.vaʁ\
The verdict
“bouvard” is a moderately-common French word, ranked #32,313 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #32,313
- frequency rank, French
- 7
- letters
- 10
- tracked misspellings
- 9
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Gros marteau qui servait autrefois à frapper les monnaies, avant l'invention du balancier.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | bouvard |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \bu.vaʁ\ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #32,313 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 9 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “bouvard” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for bouvard is 7 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \bu.vaʁ\. Corpus data places it at rank #32,313 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Gros marteau qui servait autrefois à frapper les monnaies, avant l'invention du balancier.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 10 likely wrong-spelling variants for bouvard, with forms such as "bbouvard", "bouavrd", and "bouvadr". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 9 confusable-pair relationships, "boyard", "Bovary", "board", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct French form is bouvard, spelled B-O-U-V-A-R-D.
Definition
- 1Gros marteau qui servait autrefois à frapper les monnaies, avant l'invention du balancier.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: bbouvard,bouavrd,bouvadr,bouvardd,bouvarrd,bouvrad,bouvvard,bovuard,buovard,obuvard
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of bouvard - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 "bouvard"?
What does "bouvard" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "bouvard"?
How do you pronounce "bouvard"?
What language does "bouvard" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “bouvard”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is B-O-U-V-A-R-D - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \bu.vaʁ\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “boyard” - see the side-by-side comparison. bouvard vs boyard
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
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.