talionvstalonWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“talion” and “talon” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#44,767
“talion” frequency rank
#10,252
“talon” frequency rank
55019
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature talion talon
Definition Pénalité qui consiste à infliger au coupable le traitement même qu’il a fait subir ou voulu faire subir à sa victime. Partie postérieure du pied.

Where the eye mixes talion and talon

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. talion runs 6 letters (CVCVVC) against talon's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
talion
5 ch
talon

Look-alike desk: talion vs talon

A purely visual mix-up. talion (\ta.ljɔ̃\) and talon (\ta.lɔ̃\) 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 55019, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

talion is recorded at frequency rank #44,767, classified as anoun, pronounced \ta.ljɔ̃\. talon is at rank #10,252, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ta.lɔ̃\.

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 55019, this pair ranks #130,173 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of talion vs talon

Shared letters: alnot. Private to "talion": i. Private to "talon": -.

"talion" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC  ·  "talon" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • talion ← atlion · tailon · talino · talionn · tallion · taloin · tlaion · ttalion
  • talon ← atlon · tallon · talno · talonn · taoln · tlaon · ttalon

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "talion" and "talon" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ta.ljɔ̃\ versus \ta.lɔ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "talion" or "talon" show up more?
"talon" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,252 in our French list, against #44,767 for "talion". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "talion" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "talon" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #130,173 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "talion" and "talon" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "taliban vs talion". 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 #130,173 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list