quintessence

/\kɛ̃.te.sɑ̃s\/ noun

Letters

12 characters

Frequency Rank

#35,667

in French word usage

Misspellings

16

tracked variants

Confusables

0

similar word pairs

quintessence is aFrenchnoun. It means: Cinquième élément, qui s’ajoute chez les philosophes anciens aux quatre premiers (la terre, le feu, l’air, l’eau) et qui en assure la cohésion ou la vie. Pronounced \kɛ̃.te.sɑ̃s\.

Key facts for quintessence
PropertyValue
Headwordquintessence
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\kɛ̃.te.sɑ̃s\
Letters12
Frequency rank#35,667
Misspellings tracked16
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

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

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for quintessence is 12 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \kɛ̃.te.sɑ̃s\. Corpus data places it at rank #35,667 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 7 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 16 documented wrong-spelling variants for quintessence, with forms such as "qiuntessence", "qquintessence", and "quinetssence". 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 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 quintessence, spelled Q-U-I-N-T-E-S-S-E-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
    Cinquième élément, qui s’ajoute chez les philosophes anciens aux quatre premiers (la terre, le feu, l’air, l’eau) et qui en assure la cohésion ou la vie.
  2. 2
    Partie la plus subtile extraite de quelques corps, essence, éther.
  3. 3
    Essence, concentré.
  4. 4
    Ce qu’il y a de principal, de plus précieux, de plus caché dans une affaire, dans un discours, dans un livre.
  5. 5
    Ce qu’il y a de plus fin, d’essentiel, de meilleur dans une chose ou chez une personne.
  6. 6
    Forme subtile, épurée, abstraite, éthérée.
  7. 7
    Forme hypothétique d’énergie noire, proposée comme explication aux observations de l’accélération de l’expansion de l’univers.

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: qiuntessence,qquintessence,quinetssence,quinntessence,quintesence,quintesesnce,quintessecne,quintessencce,quintessenec,quintessennce,quintessnece,quintsesence,quinttessence,quitnessence,qunitessence,uqintessence

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for quintessence

Misspelling Variants of "quintessence"

qiuntessence12qquintessence13quinetssence12quinntessence13quintesence11quintesesnce12quintessecne12quintessencce13
Misspelling Variants of "quintessence"

Frequency rank: #35,667 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "quintessence"?
"quintessence" is spelled Q-U-I-N-T-E-S-S-E-N-C-E. The IPA pronunciation is \kɛ̃.te.sɑ̃s\.
What does "quintessence" mean?
As a noun, "quintessence" means: Cinquième élément, qui s’ajoute chez les philosophes anciens aux quatre premiers (la terre, le feu, l’air, l’eau) et qui en assure la cohésion ou la vie.
What are common misspellings of "quintessence"?
Common misspellings include "qiuntessence", "qquintessence", "quinetssence", "quinntessence", "quintesence". The correct spelling is "quintessence".
How do you pronounce "quintessence"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "quintessence" is \kɛ̃.te.sɑ̃s\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "quintessence" come from?
"quintessence" 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 Q 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.