How to spell gaunt

hear itgaunt/ɡɔnt/adjectiveLong vowels

What it means: Bare, thin, and grim in appearance.

In a sentence: The tall, old tree looked gaunt in the winter.

The part people get wrong

Often misspelled as gauntt or gauntn.

Same family: gaunter, gauntest, thin, emaciated, haggard. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: “Gaunt” came into English in the 15th century and is probably related to a Scandinavian word meaning ‘thin’ or ‘wasted.’ It has long been used in literature to describe characters worn down by hardship, illness, or hunger.

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Words like this

haunt · jaunt · shout · author · august · haul · got · baseball

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