éléphant de mer
\e.le.fɑ̃ də mɛʁ\
The verdict
“éléphant de mer” 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
- 15
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Grand phoque des mers antarctiques et des côtes occidentales d’Amérique du Nord, dont les mâles ont une sorte de trompe.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | éléphant de mer |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \e.le.fɑ̃ də mɛʁ\ |
| Letters | 15 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “éléphant de mer” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for éléphant de mer is 15 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \e.le.fɑ̃ də mɛʁ\. 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 éléphant de mer 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 éléphant de mer, spelled É-L-É-P-H-A-N-T- -D-E- -M-E-R, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Grand phoque des mers antarctiques et des côtes occidentales d’Amérique du Nord, dont les mâles ont une sorte de trompe.
- 2Morse ^([1]).
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, “éléphant de mer, 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/elephant-de-mer
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “éléphant de mer”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is É-L-É-P-H-A-N-T- -D-E- -M-E-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \e.le.fɑ̃ də mɛʁ\ (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 É in our French index: