spell

Questions about spell

What is another word for spell?

It depends which spell you mean. In the sense “orally recite the letters of or give the spelling of”, the synonyms are spell out. Across all 10 senses there are 14 distinct synonyms, and they are not interchangeable with each other — this page lists them under the sense each one belongs to.

What is the opposite of spell?

The recorded antonym is unspell. Opposites are sense-specific too: this page shows which meaning each one is the opposite of, because a word rarely has a single opposite that holds for all of its senses.

Why are the synonyms for spell split into groups?

Because spell carries 10 recorded senses and each has its own set of substitutes. A single flat list would put words from unrelated meanings side by side with nothing to tell them apart, which is exactly how a writer picks the wrong one. The grouping comes from WordNet's synsets, not from an editorial judgement of ours.

Where do the synonyms for spell come from?

From Princeton University's WordNet, a lexical database maintained by lexicographers since 1985. A synonym here means a word form that shares a synset with this word — a set of forms interchangeable in one recorded context. Nothing on this page is generated by a language model.

Other views of spell

• Full entry for spellAll 10 senses, with examples, usage labels, syllables and pronunciation.
• Rhymes for spellWords matching from the last stressed vowel onward, grouped by syllable count.
• Thesaurus homeHow WordNet synsets work, and the collections built for synonym work.