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Commonly Misspelled Words in Phrases

By Judy Vorfeld

FREE REIGN OR FREE REIN? It’s “rein.” Microsoft Encarta says it’s the com­plete free­dom to make deci­sions and take action with­out con­sult­ing any­one else. The Cambridge Dictionary of Idioms says “free rein” is syn­ony­mous with “allow” and “give.” If you give peo­ple, ideas, or emo­tions free rein, they are free to develop with­out the intru­sion of con­trol­ling elements.

SNEAK PEAK, SNEEK PEEK, OR SNEAK PEEK? When you glance quickly and stealth­ily at some­thing, it’s a “sneak peek.”

NASH, KNASH, OR GNASH YOUR TEETH? You “gnash” your teeth when you are extremely angry or upset. If you have trou­ble with that, think “grind,” the start with a “g” and the “nash” should follow.

IN THE NICK, KNICK, OR GNICK OF TIME? In the “nick” of time means at the last pos­si­ble moment. A nick is (was) a mark put on a stick used to mea­sure time.

THE SOLE OF DISCRETION OR THE SOUL OF DISCRETION? It’s “soul.”

BATED BREATH OR BAITED BREATH? It’s “bated.” The Cambridge International Dictionary of Idioms says, “If you wait for some­thing with bated breath, you feel very excited or anx­ious while you’re waiting.”

HEAR! HEAR! OR HERE! HERE! “Hear, hear!” is used as an excla­ma­tion to show strong approval. You use this type of a phrase when applaud­ing a dynamic speaker or fol­low­ing a writ­ten state­ment that you feel is unusu­ally fine. Some peo­ple mis­tak­enly write, “Here, here!” but if you remem­ber that it means, “Listen, lis­ten!” you’ll write it properly.

SIDE NOTE:

VIOLA OR VOILA? It’s only one word, but it has sev­eral totally dif­fer­ent mean­ings and pronunciations:


  1. A viola (vee-oh-lah) is a stringed instru­ment that is larger than a vio­lin and smaller than a ‘cello.

  2. A viola (vye-oh-lah) is a tiny flower.

  3. “Voila!” (vwah-lah) is an inter­jec­tion that is “used to call atten­tion, to express sat­is­fac­tion or approval, or to sug­gest an appear­ance as if by magic.”

Here’s a site with word and phrase ori­gins, and another called The Phrase Finder.

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