Hex

How to spell hex

3 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce hex

What does hex mean?

1. nounA magic spell intended to bring bad luck or harm to someone.
2. verbTo cast a spell on someone in order to bring them bad luck or harm.

Hex in a sentence

• noun

  The old story claimed a hex had been placed on the farmhouse.

• verb

  The villagers feared she could hex anyone who crossed her.

• noun

  After three breakdowns in a week, she joked that the car was under a hex.

• verb

  In the tale, a jealous rival tried to hex the bride before her wedding.

Where does hex come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Hex came into American English in the early 1800s from Pennsylvania German, the dialect spoken by German settlers in Pennsylvania, where it derives from the German word Hexe, meaning 'witch'. The related verb hexen meant 'to practise witchcraft' or 'to cast a spell', and English borrowed both the idea of the witch and the act of cursing, narrowing the sense to mean a malevolent spell or to put one on someone. The Germanic root behind Hexe is ancient and is also connected to the second element of the English word 'hag'. The spelling is refreshingly phonetic, but writers sometimes pause over it because the same three letters appear as the unrelated numerical prefix 'hex-' meaning six, which comes instead from Greek hex. The word stayed largely regional in American folk culture before spreading into wider use through stories of curses and bad luck.

How the word is built

• hex (from German Hexe: witch); functions as a complete root word with no affixes