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An email in which balloon was spelled “baloon” got me thinking about words with double letters.
Many of the most frequently-misspelled words in English are misspelled by leaving out a letter.
Others are misspelled because we think a letter should be doubled, so we put in an extra one.
I thought it might be useful to organize these frequently-misspelled words into three categories.
Words we try to spell with too few letters
balloon
dumbbell
embarrass
millennium
misspell
occurrence
possession
broccoli
occasionally
questionnaire
coolly
dissipate
difference
generally
incidentally
magically
success
Words that have double letters, but not as many as we think
deterrence
harass
personnel
recommend
referred
disappear
disappoint
finally
fulfill
necessary
occasion
occurred
parallel
sheriff
tomorrow
Words that don’t have double letters, but we want to add them
preferable
procedure
coliseum
labeled
NOTE:
i. There’s also the spelling colosseum with a double s.
ii. British usage doubles the l in labelled.
Caveat to writers of British English: Most word-processing software comes with spell-checkers programmed for American spelling usage.
Another NOTE: Merriam-Webster gives programmed as the first spelling and programed as an alternate. Go figure.
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Another word we try to spell with too few letters:
accommodate
Love your site! It appeals to the stickler in me!
My favorite: bookkeeper. I don’t know if this is true, but I once read that it is the only word in the English language with three consecutive sets of double letters.
I heard that too Greg May.
How about Jewellery -X- Jewelery and Travelled -X- Traveled for more words we want to add extra letters too.
Common misspellings – a topic after my own heart.
Having been taught British English in school (in the Netherlands, before the internet), my main struggle to spell words correctly comes from being confronted with American/international English more than British.
For ‘to marvel’ goes the same as for ‘to label’ — British: marvelled, marvellous / American: marveled, marvelous.
On a side-note: in British English, the word ‘fulfill’ doesn’t have any double letters at all and is spelled ‘fulfil’.
Thanks for the easy-to-follow format of this post! The word I see often misspelled is APOLOGIZE. People, only one “P”!
Greg,
According to the experts at AskOxford, bookkeeper
“is not the only word of this kind, but it is the only one in which omission of the medial hyphen is a practical option, which it is not in, for example, hoof-footed or sweet-toothed.”
Don’t misspell misspell.
How about travelling? I think there is a difference between the American and British spelling?
I like the look of the double l.
Assassin. I always screw this one up. Four s’s just seems too many.
Great post, what about travelling that double L is British usage I presume so
my main struggle to spell words correctly comes from being confronted with American/international English more than British.
It seems funny to call it “American/international English”, given that of all the countries that have “an” English (i.e., not just those in which English is the primary language; I mean places like India, Malaysia, etc.), and all English-native countries except the US, and most everywhere it’s taught, except Japan, British English is the norm.
@Peter — Ah, I suppose you’re right. It often seems American is ‘the international flavour’ of English, though.
An Australian writer friend of mine recently told me she had to ask her Australian friends to have a critical look at her stories in regard to idioms that may be American in origin. She blames American television series.
– Of course, this example is not so much about spelling. Still, it made me think…
Then there’s desiccate, which is often misspelt/misspelled.
And broccoli that always gives me fits when I make a shopping list (yes, I could stop eating it, I suppose).
Here there are several words already discussed in this forum: http://www.askoxford.com/bette.....g/?view=uk
Finally, instalment (UK) is one word that has a single letter where the US version has two.
Nisus, a word processing programme for Mac, does include a lot of languages, including British, Australian and U.S. English. I love it!
Don’t forget “vacuum,” which I often see spelled “vaccuum” or even “vaccum.” I never understood why the “uu” spelling was hard to remember, as this is the only common word with double u’s (as opposed to double-u, w).