casus belli
\ka.zys bɛ.li\
The verdict
“casus belli” is outside the top-ranked French vocabulary, used as a noun - the kind of word writers most often double-check.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Acte de guerre, acte qui peut motiver une guerre.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | casus belli |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \ka.zys bɛ.li\ |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “casus belli” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for casus belli is 11 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \ka.zys bɛ.li\. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No misspelling variants are generated for casus belli in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
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. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct French form is casus belli, spelled C-A-S-U-S- -B-E-L-L-I, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Acte de guerre, acte qui peut motiver une guerre.
- 2Acte qui peut entraîner une bagarre ou une dispute.
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.
Cite this page
Free to reuse with attribution (CC BY-SA). Copy the citation:
PlainSpell, “casus belli, French word data” (May 6, 2026). Derived from Wiktionary (kaikki.org, CC BY-SA) and an open word-frequency list. https://plainspell.com/fr/mot/casus-belli
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "casus belli"?
What does "casus belli" mean?
How do you pronounce "casus belli"?
What language does "casus belli" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “casus belli”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is C-A-S-U-S- -B-E-L-L-I - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \ka.zys bɛ.li\ (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
Nearby French words
Other entries that begin with the letter C in our French index: