serpent de mer
\sɛʁ.pɑ̃ də mɛʁ\
The verdict
“serpent de mer” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 14
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Grand animal marin, souvent considéré comme mythique, à l’allure de serpent.
Corpus desk
Index FR-serpent-de-mer · serpent de mer · French
serpent de mer · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 14 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "S" 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 | serpent de mer |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \sɛʁ.pɑ̃ də mɛʁ\ |
| Letters | 14 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « serpent de mer » en français
Rare enough to double-check
serpent de mer is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed \sɛʁ.pɑ̃ də mɛʁ\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
serpent de mer has no tracked misspelling variants, a sign its spelling follows regular French conventions. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct French form is serpent de mer, spelled S-E-R-P-E-N-T- -D-E- -M-E-R.
Definition
- 1Grand animal marin, souvent considéré comme mythique, à l’allure de serpent.
- 2Sujet d’actualité dont on ne voit jamais la réalité.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how serpent de mer appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
La Bible mentionna pour le catholicisme son Leviathan, le grand serpent de mer bien autrement formidable que l’agile et tortueuse couleuvre dont la religion païenne pétrifia les ondulations au caducée de Mercure.
Dans ces parages se tient aussi, dit-on, le fameux serpent de mer, dont la mythologie scandinave et les sagas islandaises font si souvent mention. Les marins du Nord ont toujours cru à son existence : […]. L’évêque Pontoppidan prétend avoir vu le serpent de mer, et même de nos jours des marins l’ont signalé en 1873 et en 1875 dans la baie du Massachusetts.
Synonyms
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.