dames
\dam\
The verdict
“dames” is a regularly-used French word, ranked #4,140 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #4,140
- frequency rank, French
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Jeu de dames, jeu stratégique à deux joueurs, se jouant avec des pions blancs et noirs sur un damier de 64, 100 ou 144 cases selon la variante des règles utilisée.
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 | dames |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \dam\ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #4,140 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “dames” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for dames is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \dam\. Corpus data places it at rank #4,140 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Jeu de dames, jeu stratégique à deux joueurs, se jouant avec des pions blancs et noirs sur un damier de 64, 100 ou 144 cases selon la variante des règles utilisée.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for dames, with forms such as "admes", "daems", and "damess". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "des", "das", "dans", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is dames, spelled D-A-M-E-S.
Definition
- 1Jeu de dames, jeu stratégique à deux joueurs, se jouant avec des pions blancs et noirs sur un damier de 64, 100 ou 144 cases selon la variante des règles utilisée.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: admes,daems,damess,dammes,damse,ddames,dmaes
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of dames - 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
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Using “dames”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is D-A-M-E-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \dam\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “des” - see the side-by-side comparison. dames vs des
- 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.