Is 'compatriate' really an English word?

I recently saw the word 'compatriate' used in a newspaper article. Upon looking it up, suspecting a typo (or even an eggcorn: it is easy to see how compatriot would be mixed-up with expatriate etc.), I was surprised to see Wiktionary vouch for the word with the sole explanation: "Alternative spelling of compatriot".

However, not only did my googling yield extremely few credible uses of this spelling, none of the dictionaries I have access to have ever heard of it: both dictionary.com and Merriam Webster do not return anything.

While I don't want to cast unfair aspersions on Wiktionary's reliability, I find it slightly suspicious that no other online sources mention this spelling... And if it is an acceptable spelling, I would love to know what is its relation to the main spelling and whether it is tied to particular regional or historical practices.

Solution 1:

The OED has no entry for compatriate. The entry for compatriot has no other spelling, and nor do any of the citations, from 1611 to 1871.

I shouldn't worry about casting aspersions on any source whose definitions are not backed either by implicit or explicit evidence.

Solution 2:

There are ~700 results for ?:compatriate in books; this is relatively rare, esp. compared to compatriot which is 3 orders of magnitude more common in the same corpus.

However, looking at books that also mention the word dictionary I found 'An etymological dictionary of the English language' by Walter William Skeat, unfortunately you can't see in what context it is mentioned there (or if it might have been a scanning error).

EDIT: COHA, COCA and BYU-BNC find no matches (ref).

Solution 3:

It's amusing to note that expatriot (vs the proper expatriate) is in at least one eggcorn database, while compatriate (vs compatriot) is not. (Not yet, at least.)