“Virtue” is spelled “Virtue”

By Maeve Maddox

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Looking for tips on how to remove wallpaper, I found this headline on the HGTV page:

How to Remove Wallpaper: Patience Is a Virture

Curious to see if this was a common misspelling, I did a Google search and came up with 133,000 hits for “virture.”

Many of them were from comments and forums where people often type quickly and may be forgiven for typos.

Most occurred in the adage “patience is a virtue.”

However, numerous examples of the misspelling occur in contexts in which the correct spelling was almost certainly in front of the writer’s eyes.

… Is A Virture Bags, Tote Bags, & Messenger Bags

This example is from an ad selling printed tote bags. The bags are printed with a message that says something or other “is a virtue.” The word is spelled correctly on the bags, which are pictured under the misspelled header.

“I don’t know…when they decided…to make a virture out of SELFISHNESS.”

This quotation, presumably copied from a speech, appears on a political ad.

Interview with Ronald Sandler, Author of Character and Environment: A Virture-Oriented Approach to Environmental Ethics

This heads an article at the Columbia University site. The title on the pictured book cover is Character and Environment: A virtue-oriented approach to environmental ethics.

Love Is a Virture

This is a photo caption under a picture of what appears to be a poster. The words “Love is a Virtue” are on the photo itself.

Copying words correctly is a virtue.


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3 Responses to ““Virtue” is spelled “Virtue””

  • Laurel L. Russwurm

    In terms of typos, the letters “e” and “r” ARE adjacent on the standard Canadian keyboard.

    But I’m wondering, due to the very large numbers of this error, if it’s possible the error to exist within on of the major spell check libraries?

  • Maeve

    @Laurel
    It is an error very easy to make while typing. I did it myself in writing the article.

  • Julie

    Job security for careful editors! 😉

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