I before E, except after C in English

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{
  "etymology_text": "Formed because of the rhyme between the names of the letters E and C, /iː/ and /siː/. The \"rule\" was invented in the 19th century.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "proverb",
        "head": ""
      },
      "expansion": "I before E, except after C",
      "name": "head"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "I before E, except after C",
      "name": "en-proverb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "proverb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English mnemonics",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English proverbs",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Orthography",
          "orig": "en:Orthography",
          "parents": [
            "Writing",
            "Human behaviour",
            "Language",
            "Human",
            "Communication",
            "All topics",
            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "In English words that contain the letters I and E together, the I tends to come before the E (ie), except in cases when the two are preceded by the letter C, in which case the E comes before the I (cei)."
      ],
      "id": "en-I_before_E,_except_after_C-en-proverb-I8DV8tS6",
      "links": [
        [
          "orthography",
          "orthography"
        ],
        [
          "mnemonic",
          "mnemonic"
        ],
        [
          "English",
          "English"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(orthography, mnemonic) In English words that contain the letters I and E together, the I tends to come before the E (ie), except in cases when the two are preceded by the letter C, in which case the E comes before the I (cei)."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "tags": [
            "common-gender"
          ],
          "word": "i before e, except after"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "mnemonic"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "communications",
        "journalism",
        "literature",
        "media",
        "orthography",
        "publishing",
        "writing"
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "I before E except after C"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "I before E, except after C"
}

[Show JSON for raw wiktextract data ▼] [Hide JSON for raw wiktextract data ▲]

{
  "etymology_text": "Formed because of the rhyme between the names of the letters E and C, /iː/ and /siː/. The \"rule\" was invented in the 19th century.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "proverb",
        "head": ""
      },
      "expansion": "I before E, except after C",
      "name": "head"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "I before E, except after C",
      "name": "en-proverb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "proverb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English lemmas",
        "English mnemonics",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English proverbs",
        "en:Orthography"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "In English words that contain the letters I and E together, the I tends to come before the E (ie), except in cases when the two are preceded by the letter C, in which case the E comes before the I (cei)."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "orthography",
          "orthography"
        ],
        [
          "mnemonic",
          "mnemonic"
        ],
        [
          "English",
          "English"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(orthography, mnemonic) In English words that contain the letters I and E together, the I tends to come before the E (ie), except in cases when the two are preceded by the letter C, in which case the E comes before the I (cei)."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "mnemonic"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "communications",
        "journalism",
        "literature",
        "media",
        "orthography",
        "publishing",
        "writing"
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "I before E except after C"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "tags": [
        "common-gender"
      ],
      "word": "i before e, except after"
    }
  ],
  "word": "I before E, except after C"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-09 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (4d5d0bb and edd475d). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.

"I before E, except after C" meaning in English

Proverb