silex

\si.lɛks\

/\si.lɛks\/ noun

The verdict

“silex” has 7 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #20,854. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#20,854
frequency rank, French
6,032
“S” headwords
7
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Roche chimique siliceuse très dure se présentant sous forme de nodules de taille variable à la surface ou dans les formations calcaires et constituée de calcédoine presque pure et d’impuretés telle...

Corpus desk

Index FR-silex · silex · French

silex · rank #20,854 · 7 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #20,854
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-MID 7 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,032
  • PHOTO-FINISH signifient

Nearest frequency peer: signifient (-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.

Pairs de rang près de l'aimant d'erreurs « silex »

Même bande de rareté: utile si une faute tombe sur un lemme voisin

corpus weight

What this shows « silex » siège parmi ces pairs FrequencyWords; la profondeur des fautes est suivie à part dans le graphique d'édition.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

silex vs six
60% similar
silex vs site
60% similar
silex vs sire
60% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for silex
PropertyValue
Headwordsilex
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\si.lɛks\
Letters5
Frequency rank#20,854
Misspellings tracked7
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Fréquence de l'aimant d'erreurs « silex »

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).silexse place ici:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Les tics avancent en logarithme; chacun est de l'ordre de dix fois plus rare. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « signifient » (#20,853), « slow » (#20,855), « Shirley » (#20,852). Parmi 6,032 lemmes en « S », « silex » est au #20,854. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 7 spelling variants around silex (IPA \si.lɛks\), anoun. Corpus frequency is #20,854 among 6,032 “S” headwords. Dominant gloss: "Roche chimique siliceuse très dure se présentant sous forme de nodules de taille variable à la surface ou dans les formations calcaires et constituée de calcédoine presque pure et d’impuretés telle...".

Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for silex, with forms such as "islex", "sielx", and "silexx". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "six", "site", "sire", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.

This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is silex, spelled S-I-L-E-X.

Definition

  1. 1
    Roche chimique siliceuse très dure se présentant sous forme de nodules de taille variable à la surface ou dans les formations calcaires et constituée de calcédoine presque pure et d’impuretés telles que de l'eau ou des oxydes, ces derniers influant sur sa couleur.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how silex appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. L'homme primitif, […], ne savait mettre en usage que des os, des cailloux, des débris de silex, et c'est avec ces matériaux qu'il fabriquait ses armes grossières et ses rares ustensiles, ainsi que le font encore quelques peuplades sauvages de la Polynésie.
  2. Les éléments dominants de ses alluvions sont les silex dérivés de l'argile à silex, des nodules de phosphate de chaux, de quartz, et des fragments de grès: […].

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • islex
  • sielx
  • silexx
  • sillex
  • silxe
  • sliex
  • ssilex

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of silex - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.

islex2sielx2silexx1sillex1silxe2sliex2ssilex1
Edit distance from "silex"

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 "silex"?
"silex" is spelled S-I-L-E-X. The IPA pronunciation is \si.lɛks\.
What does "silex" mean?
As a noun, "silex" means: Roche chimique siliceuse très dure se présentant sous forme de nodules de taille variable à la surface ou dans les formations calcaires et constituée de calcédoine presque pure et d’impuretés telle...
What words are commonly confused with "silex"?
"silex" is commonly confused with "six", "site", "sire". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "silex"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "silex" is \si.lɛks\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "silex" come from?
"silex" is a French word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "silex", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (7 here; floor ≥5).

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list