Which to use
“marquise” and “marquises” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #16,412
- “marquise” frequency rank
- #44,572
- “marquises” frequency rank
- 60984
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | marquise | marquises |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Épouse ou veuve d’un marquis. | Pluriel de marquise. |
Same sound, different letters: marquise vs marquises
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 8 letters. marquise runs 8 letters (CVCCVVCV) against marquises's 9 (CVCCVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Ear matches; page differs - marquise and marquises
This is the hard kind. marquise and marquises are pronounced identically (\maʁ.kiz\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “marquise” sits inside “marquises”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60984, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
marquise is recorded at frequency rank #16,412, classified as anoun, pronounced \maʁ.kiz\. marquises is at rank #44,572, tagged as anoun, pronounced \maʁ.kiz\.
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 60984, this pair ranks #94,717 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of marquise vs marquises
Shared letters: aeimqrsu. Private to "marquise": -. Private to "marquises": -.
"marquise" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVVCV · "marquises" · 9 letters · shape CVCCVVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "marquise" for "marquises" ever safe?
Frequency check: "marquise" vs "marquises" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.
- Full dictionary entry for "marquise" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "marquises" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #94,717 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "marquise" and "marquises" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "marquées vs marquises". 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 #94,717 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.