mal de Naples
\mal də napl\
The verdict
“mal de Naples” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 13
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Syphilis.
Corpus desk
Index FR-mal-de-naples · mal de Naples · French
mal de Naples · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 13 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "M" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | mal de Naples |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \mal də napl\ |
| Letters | 13 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « mal de Naples » en français
Rare enough to double-check
mal de Naples is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed \mal də napl\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Syphilis.".
mal de Naples has no tracked misspelling variants, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
This entry's etymology isn't recorded, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is mal de Naples, spelled M-A-L- -D-E- -N-A-P-L-E-S.
Definition
- 1Syphilis.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how mal de Naples appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
LA maladie que nous apellons mal de Naples & les Italiens mal François , fut portée des Indes Occidentales ou nouueau monde par les Espagnols qui y allèrent premierement auec Christofle Colomb Genois, lesquels prindrent ce mal des femmes de l'isle que les Indiens apellent Haiti Quisqueia.
Les Français , dit un de nos historiens , qui en furent infectés par des Napolitaines , la nommèrent mal de Naples : les Italiens chez lesquels les Français la répandirent à leur retour , l'appelèrent le mal français.
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.