lieue
\ljø\
The verdict
“lieue” is uncommon French (frequency #51,576 among 2,567 “L” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #51,576
- frequency rank, French
- 2,567
- “L” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Unité de distance de l’ancien régime, d’environ quatre kilomètres.
Corpus desk
Index FR-lieue · lieue · French
lieue · rank #51,576 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #51,576
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 2,567
- PHOTO-FINISH lichen
Nearest frequency peer: lichen (-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.
Rangs de longue queue près de « lieue »
Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court
- LHC
LHC
48,428 corpus weight
- lichen
lichen
48,426 corpus weight
- lieue
lieue
48,425 corpus weight
- Lindbergh
Lindbergh
48,424 corpus weight
- lisaient
lisaient
48,423 corpus weight
- littorales
littorales
48,422 corpus weight
What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « lieue » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | lieue |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \ljø\ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #51,576 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « lieue » en français
Rare enough to double-check
lieue is uncommon French at frequency #51,576 among 2,567 “L” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ljø\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for lieue, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is lieue, spelled L-I-E-U-E.
Definition
- 1Unité de distance de l’ancien régime, d’environ quatre kilomètres.
- 2Grande distance.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how lieue appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Nous avions fait neuf lieues de pays, qui, sans exagération, en valent bien douze ou quatorze de France ; c’était une bonne journée.
Topographiquement parlant, nous avons peu d’observations à faire sur cette chaussée à peu près rectilinéaire de six grandes lieues qui nous reste à parcourir de Thonon à Genève.
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); 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 "lieue"?
What does "lieue" mean?
How do you pronounce "lieue"?
What language does "lieue" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Similar French words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "lieue", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked French headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).