lance

/\lɑ̃s\/ noun

Letters

5 characters

Frequency Rank

#1,441

in French word usage

Misspellings

7

tracked variants

Confusables

20

similar word pairs

lance is aFrenchnoun. It means: Arme à long bois, terminée par un fer pointu et qui, au Moyen Âge, était fort grosse vers la poignée. Pronounced \lɑ̃s\. It ranks #1,441 in French word frequency. Often confused with lune and lave.

Key facts for lance
PropertyValue
Headwordlance
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\lɑ̃s\
Letters5
Frequency rank#1,441
Misspellings tracked7
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

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

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for lance is 5 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \lɑ̃s\. Corpus data places it at rank #1,441 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 8 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 7 documented wrong-spelling variants for lance, with forms such as "alnce", "lacne", and "lancce". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "lune", "lave", "line", and more, 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 lance, spelled L-A-N-C-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Arme à long bois, terminée par un fer pointu et qui, au Moyen Âge, était fort grosse vers la poignée.
  2. 2
    Longue pique dont certains corps de cavalerie en France ou à l’étranger étaient armés.
  3. 3
    Homme d’armes armé d’une lance, lancier.
  4. 4
    Toutes sortes d’objets qui en rappellent la forme.
  5. 5
    Toutes sortes d’objets qui en rappellent la forme.
  6. 6
    Tuyau terminé par un embout solide plus ou moins long et utilisé pour arroser.
  7. 7
    Meuble représentant l’arme du même nom dans les armoiries. Elle est généralement représentée sous la forme d'une lance de tournoi. À rapprocher de dard, épieu, javelot, lance de tournoi et pique.
  8. 8
    Pièce du jeu de shōgi, qui avance d’une ou de plusieurs cases, toujours vers l’avant, et qui doit être promue une fois arrivée sur la dernière rangée.

Synonyms

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: alnce,lacne,lancce,lanec,lannce,llance,lnace

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for lance

Misspelling Variants of "lance"

alnce5lacne5lancce6lanec5lannce6llance6lnace5
Misspelling Variants of "lance"

Frequency rank: #1,441 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "lance"?
"lance" is spelled L-A-N-C-E. The IPA pronunciation is \lɑ̃s\.
What does "lance" mean?
As a noun, "lance" means: Arme à long bois, terminée par un fer pointu et qui, au Moyen Âge, était fort grosse vers la poignée.
What words are commonly confused with "lance"?
"lance" is commonly confused with "lune", "lave", "line". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "lance"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "lance" is \lɑ̃s\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "lance" come from?
"lance" 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 L 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.