Word Confusion: Carat vs Karat vs Caret vs Carrot

Posted October 10, 2013 by Kathy Davie in Author Resources, Self-Editing, Word Confusions, Writing

Revised as of
29 June 2023

Whoa . . . who knew this many homonymic carrots were running around loose!

It’s all golden, however, from the value of a carat in a gemstone to the total karats in gold jewelry to the value of an inserted caret to that juicy carrot which I’d rather encounter than a stick!

Word Confusions . . .

. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.

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Carat Karat Caret Carrot

2,860-carat Columbian Emerald is Andrew Boss‘ own work is under the CC BY 2.5 license, via Wikimedia Commons.


Gold Bar by Erik Stein is under the Pixabay License, via Pixabay.

I reckon a gold bar is 24-karat gold…*grin*…

Thank goodness for the caret to indicate exactly where the problem is.


Carrots by Willi Heidelbach is in the public domain, via PxHere.

Part of Grammar:
Noun

karat [British]

Noun

[British] carat

Noun

A.k.a., hat, control, uparrow, chevron, xor sign, to the power of, pointer, wedge

Noun
Plural: carats, karats [British] Plural: karats, carats [British] Plural: carets Plural: carrots
Unit of weight for precious stones and pearls, now equivalent to 200 milligrams Measure of the purity of gold with pure gold being 24 karats A proofreader’s mark (^) placed below the line (^) to indicate a proposed insertion in a printed or written text

An inverted V-shaped grapheme that is sometimes used as a spacing character

A circumflex accent

[Computers] Used to mark the beginning of a string or the beginning of a line within that string

[Mathematics] Used to signify exponentiation where the usual superscript is not readily usable (as on some graphing calculators)

Tapering orange-colored root eaten as a vegetable

Cultivated plant of the parsley family with feathery leaves, which yields this vegetable

  • Daucus carota, family Umbelliferae: two subspecies and many varieties (wild forms lack the swollen root)

An offer of something enticing as a means of persuasion

Often contrasted with the threat of something punitive or unwelcome

Examples:
He gave her a half-carat diamond ring.

Diamond carat weight is the measurement of how much a diamond weighs.

Thus began a tradition of each queen consort having a crown made specially for her.

In 1902, a crown was created for Queen Alexandra using the 105-carat Kohinoor diamond.

The Hope Diamond weighs in at 45.52 carats.

The Princess Diana’s engagement ring has an 18-carat oval blue sapphire.

He had an ounce of 24-karat gold.

Karat (K) tells the number of parts, by weight, of gold in 24 parts of alloy.

The higher the percentage of pure gold, the higher the karat.

I used a caret in the photo above to indicate a missing word.

Mark is buying a château in the Loire Valley.

Pascal uses the caret for declaring pointers and when dereferencing them.

3^5 for 35

Carrots will promote cooperation over the environment far more effectively than sticks.

I love those baby carrots for munching on.

The basis for a mirepoix is celery, onion, and carrots.

History of the Word:
Late Middle English carat (sense 2 of the noun) is from the French, from the Italian carato, from the Arabic ḳīrāṭ (a unit of weight), from the Greek keration meaning fruit of the carob (also denoting a unit of weight), diminutive of keras meaning horn, with reference to the elongated seedpod of the carob. Late 17th century from the Latin meaning is lacking. Late 15th century from the French carotte, which is from the Latin carota, which came from the Greek karōton.

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C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!

Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.

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Resources for Carat v Karat v Caret v Carrot

Apple Dictionary.com

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Pinterest Photo Credits

Tanzanite, Diamond, and Gold Ring by babarara is under the CC BY 2.0 license, via VisualHunt. I inserted the caret and carrot.

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