contamination

/\kɔ̃.ta.mi.na.sjɔ̃\/ noun

Letters

13 characters

Frequency Rank

#12,134

in French word usage

Misspellings

19

tracked variants

Confusables

2

similar word pairs

contamination is aFrenchnoun. It means: Souillure qui résulte du contact d’un objet impur, malpropre ou contaminant. Pronounced \kɔ̃.ta.mi.na.sjɔ̃\. Often confused with contaminations and condamnation.

Key facts for contamination
PropertyValue
Headwordcontamination
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\kɔ̃.ta.mi.na.sjɔ̃\
Letters13
Frequency rank#12,134
Misspellings tracked19
Confusable pairs2
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of contamination in French word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for contamination is 13 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \kɔ̃.ta.mi.na.sjɔ̃\. Corpus data places it at rank #12,134 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 7 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 19 documented wrong-spelling variants for contamination, with forms such as "ccontamination", "cnotamination", and "conatmination". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 2 confusable-pair relationships, "contaminations", "condamnation", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

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 contamination, spelled C-O-N-T-A-M-I-N-A-T-I-O-N, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Souillure qui résulte du contact d’un objet impur, malpropre ou contaminant.
  2. 2
    Infection produite par une maladie contagieuse.
  3. 3
    Contamination mentale.
  4. 4
    Introduction ou présence d’un contaminant dans un aliment ou dans un environnement alimentaire.
  5. 5
    Contamination radioactive.
  6. 6
    Contamination de vestiges anciens par des radionucléides faussant les méthodes de datation basée sur la mesure de la composition isotopique.
  7. 7
    Changement phonétique ou grammatical par l’influence d’un autre mot sémantiquement proche ou d'une autre langue.

Antonyms

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: ccontamination,cnotamination,conatmination,conntamination,contaimnation,contamiantion,contaminaiton,contaminatino,contaminationn,contaminatoin,contaminattion,contaminnation,contamintaion,contammination,contamniation,contmaination,conttamination,cotnamination,ocntamination

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for contamination

Misspelling Variants of "contamination"

ccontamination14cnotamination13conatmination13conntamination14contaimnation13contamiantion13contaminaiton13contaminatino13
Misspelling Variants of "contamination"

Frequency rank: #12,134 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "contamination"?
"contamination" is spelled C-O-N-T-A-M-I-N-A-T-I-O-N. The IPA pronunciation is \kɔ̃.ta.mi.na.sjɔ̃\.
What does "contamination" mean?
As a noun, "contamination" means: Souillure qui résulte du contact d’un objet impur, malpropre ou contaminant.
What words are commonly confused with "contamination"?
"contamination" is commonly confused with "contaminations", "condamnation". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "contamination"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "contamination" is \kɔ̃.ta.mi.na.sjɔ̃\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "contamination" come from?
"contamination" 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.

Nearby French words

Other entries that begin with the letter C in our French index:

Explore PlainSpell

Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.