Which to use
“marde” and “Mère” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #36,043
- “marde” frequency rank
- #292
- “Mère” frequency rank
- 36335
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | marde | Mère |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Merde. | Nom donné à la Vierge Marie. |
Where the eye mixes marde and Mère
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses marde with Mère
A purely visual mix-up. marde (\maʁd\) and Mère (\mɛʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36335, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
marde is recorded at frequency rank #36,043, classified as anoun, pronounced \maʁd\. Mère is at rank #292, tagged as anoun, pronounced \mɛʁ\.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 36335, this pair ranks #270,326 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of marde vs Mère
Shared letters: emr. Private to "marde": ad. Private to "Mère": è.
"marde" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "Mère" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- marde ← amrde · mardde · mared · marrde · mmarde · mrade
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "marde" for "Mère" ever safe?
Frequency check: "marde" vs "Mère" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "marde" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "Mère" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #270,326 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "marde" and "Mère" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maid vs marde". Nearby pair
- Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes
Confusion rank #270,326 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.