colonies

\kɔ.lɔ.ni\

/\kɔ.lɔ.ni\/ noun

The verdict

“colonies” has 11 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #5,644. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#5,644
frequency rank, French
8,609
“C” headwords
11
tracked misspellings
19
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Pluriel de colonie.

Corpus desk

Index FR-colonies · colonies · French

colonies · rank #5,644 · 11 variants · 19 confusables

  • FREQ-COMMON #5,644
  • LEN-LONG 8 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 19 pairs
  • VAR-MID 11 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 8,609
  • PHOTO-FINISH cigarette

Nearest frequency peer: cigarette (-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.

Pairs de rang près de l'aimant d'erreurs « colonies »

Même bande de rareté: utile si une faute tombe sur un lemme voisin

corpus weight

What this shows « colonies » siège parmi ces pairs FrequencyWords; la profondeur des fautes est suivie à part dans le graphique d'édition.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

colonies vs colons
75% similar
colonies vs colonne
75% similar
colonies vs cookies
75% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for colonies
PropertyValue
Headwordcolonies
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\kɔ.lɔ.ni\
Letters8
Frequency rank#5,644
Misspellings tracked11
Confusable pairs19
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Fréquence de l'aimant d'erreurs « colonies »

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).coloniesse place ici:

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

L'axe est logarithmique: chaque tic marque environ dix fois moins de fréquence. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « cigarette » (#5,643), « considérablement » (#5,645), « correct » (#5,647). Parmi 8,609 lemmes en « C », « colonies » est au #5,644. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 11 spelling variants around colonies (IPA \kɔ.lɔ.ni\), anoun. Corpus frequency is #5,644 among 8,609 “C” headwords. Dominant gloss: "Pluriel de colonie.".

Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for colonies, with forms such as "ccolonies", "cloonies", and "collonies". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 19 confusable-pair relationships, "colons", "colonne", "cookies", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is colonies, spelled C-O-L-O-N-I-E-S.

Definition

  1. 1
    Pluriel de colonie.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Oh ! ce qu’il avait de troublant et de magique, dans mon enfance, ce simple mot : « les colonies », qui, en ce temps-là, désignait pour moi l’ensemble des lointains pays chauds, avec leurs palmiers, leurs grandes fleurs, leurs nègres, leurs bêtes, leurs aventures. De la confusion que je faisais de ces choses, se dégageait un sentiment d’ensemble absolumen…
  2. Plusieurs de ces soldats assuraient que la Vendée n’était pas encore détruite ; que Charrette avait encore plus de vingt mille hommes à sa suite ; que, pour parvenir à purger ce pays, il n’y avait pas d’autre moyen que de déclimatiser tous les habitants de Vendée, et d’y envoyer en place de nouvelles colonies, car autrement nous n’en viendrions jamais à b…

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • ccolonies
  • cloonies
  • collonies
  • colnoies
  • coloines
  • coloneis
  • coloniess
  • colonise
  • colonnies
  • coolnies
  • oclonies

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of colonies - 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.

ccolonies1cloonies2collonies1colnoies2coloines2coloneis2coloniess1colonise2
Edit distance from "colonies"

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 "colonies"?
"colonies" is spelled C-O-L-O-N-I-E-S. The IPA pronunciation is \kɔ.lɔ.ni\.
What does "colonies" mean?
As a noun, "colonies" means: Pluriel de colonie.
What words are commonly confused with "colonies"?
"colonies" is commonly confused with "colons", "colonne", "cookies". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "colonies"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "colonies" is \kɔ.lɔ.ni\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "colonies" come from?
"colonies" 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 "colonies", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

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

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (11 here; floor ≥5).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list