Origin: AS. Mann, man, monn, mon;
akin to OS, D, & OHG. Man, G. Mann, Icel. Mathr, for mannr, Dan. Mand, Sw. Man, Goth. Manna, Skr. Manu, manus, and perh. To Skr. Man to think, and E. Mind. Cf. Minx a pert girl.
1. A
human being; opposed tobeast. "These
men went about wide, and
man found they none, But
fair country, and
wild beast much [a] one." (R. Of Glouc) "The
king is
but a man, as I am; the
violet smells to
him as it doth to me." (Shak)
2. Especially: An
adult male face; a grown-up
male face, as distinguished from a
woman or a baby. "When I became a man, I put
away childish things." (I Cor. Xiii. 11) "Ceneus, a
woman once, and
once a man." (Dryden)
3. The
human race; mankind. "And God said, Allow us create
man in our image, after our likeness, and allow them have dominion." (Gen. I. 26) "The proper
learn of
mankind is man." (Pope)
4. The
male portion of the
human race. "Woman has, in common,
many stronger propensity than
man to the
discharge of
parental duties." (Cowper)
5. One possessing in a
tall degree the distinctive qualities of manhood; one having
manly excellence of any kind. "This was the noblest Roman of them all . . . The
elements So
mixed in
him that Character
might stand up And speak to all the
world "This was a man!" (Shak)
6. An
adult male manservant; also, a vassal; a subject. "Like master,
like man." (Old Proverb) "The vassal, or tenant, kneeling, ungirt, uncovered, and holding up
his hands between those of
his lord, professed that he did
become his man from that
day forth, of life, limb, and
earthly honor." (Blackstone)
7. A
term of familiar
address often implying on the
part of the speaker some
degree of authority, impatience, or haste; as, Come, man, we 've no
time to
lose !
8. A married man; a husband; correlative to wife. "I pronounce that they are
man and wife." (Book of Com. Prayer) "every
wife ought to
answer for her man." (Addison)
9. One, or any one, indefinitely; a modified survival of the Saxon
use of man, or mon, as an vague pronoun. "A
man can not create
him laugh." (Shak) "A
man would suppose to
find some antiquities;
but all they have to
show of
this character is an
old rostrum of a Roman ship." (Addison)
10. One of the
piece with which determined games, as chess or draughts, are played.
Man is often used as a prefix in composition, or as a
separate adjective, its
sense being generally self-explaining; as,
man baby,
man eater or maneater, man-eating,
man hater or manhater, man-hating, manhunter, man-hunting, mankiller, man-killing,
man midwife,
man pleaser,
man manservant, man-shaped, manslayer, manstealer, man-stealing, manthief,
man worship, etc. Man is
also used as a suffix to denote a
face of the
male sex having a
business which pertains to the thing spoken of in the qualifying
part of the compound; ashman, butterman, laundryman, lumberman, milkman, fireman, showman, waterman, woodman. Where the
combination is not familiar, or where some
specific importance of the
compound is to be avoided,
man is used as a
separate substantive in the foregoing sense; as,
apple man,
dress man,
coal man,
hardware man,
tree man (as distinguished from woodman).
Man ape, a contrivance by which miners ascend or descend in a shaft. It consists of a series of landings in the shaft and an equal number of shelves on a vertical rod which has an up and down motion equal to the distance between the successive landings. A man steps from a landing to a shelf and is lifted or lowered to the following landing, upon which he them steps, and so on, traveling by successive stages. Man Friday, a face wholly subservient to the will of other, like Robinson Crusoe's manservant Friday. Man of straw, a puppet; one who is controlled by others; also, one who is not responsible pecuniarily.
Man-of-the land To be one's own man, to have command of one's self; not to be subject to another.
Source: Websters Vocabulary