sonner les cloches
\sɔ.ne le klɔʃ\
The verdict
“sonner les cloches” is outside the top-ranked French vocabulary, used as a verb - the kind of word writers most often double-check.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 18
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Gronder, réprimander vivement.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sonner les cloches |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | \sɔ.ne le klɔʃ\ |
| Letters | 18 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sonner les cloches” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for sonner les cloches is 18 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \sɔ.ne le klɔʃ\. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Gronder, réprimander vivement.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for sonner les cloches, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, 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 sonner les cloches, spelled S-O-N-N-E-R- -L-E-S- -C-L-O-C-H-E-S.
Definition
- 1Gronder, réprimander vivement.
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.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “sonner les cloches”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is S-O-N-N-E-R- -L-E-S- -C-L-O-C-H-E-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \sɔ.ne le klɔʃ\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.