father
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: note: r
enpr: fäthə
ipa: /ˈfɑːðə(ɹ)/
enpr: fäthər
ipa: /ˈfɑðɚ/
enpr: fäthə
ipa: /ˈfɐːðə/
note: Ireland, Canada, California, Western Pennsylvania, older New York City
enpr: fäthər
ipa: /ˈfɒːðɚ/
note: Ireland, Canada, California, Western Pennsylvania, older New York City
enpr: fäthər
ipa: /ˈfɔðɚ/
note: r
enpr: fäthə
ipa: /ˈfɑːd̪ə(r)/
note: r
enpr: făthə
ipa: /ˈfæðə(ɹ)/
note: Geordie, else obsolete
note: r
enpr: fāthə
ipa: /ˈfeɪðəɹ/
homophone: farther (most non-rhotic accents)
rhymes: -ɑːðə(ɹ)
other: /ɑː/
Forms: form: fathers
Etymology: Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *peh₂-?
Proto-Indo-European *-tḗr
Proto-Indo-European *ph₂tḗr
Proto-Germanic *fadēr
Proto-West Germanic *fader
Old English fæder
Middle English fader
English father
Inherited from Middle English fader, from Old English fæder, from Proto-West Germanic *fader, from Proto-Germanic *fadēr, from Proto-Indo-European *ph₂tḗr, possibly from *peh₂- + *-tḗr.
 Doublet of ayr, faeder, athair, padre, pater, and père.
Senses: examples: text: My father was a strong influence on me.
text: The Pꝛouerbes of Solomon: A wiſe ſonne maketh a glad father: but a fooliſh sonne is the heauineſſe of his mother.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Proverbs 10:1:
text: When this conversation was repeated in detail within the hearing of the young woman in question, and undoubtedly for his benefit, Mr. Trevor threw shame to the winds and scandalized the Misses Brewster then and there by proclaiming his father to have been a country storekeeper.
ref: 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
text: Ah, but how beautiful (my baby boy) is! And he is mine, mine for ever. Even if he hates me he will be mine. He cannot help it, he is made out of me; I am his father.
ref: 1905, E. M. Forster, Where Angels Fear to Tread, chapter 7
text: My personal success or failure is insignificant; the rise or fall of the nation is my responsibility and must not be shirked. Upon introspection, I feel I am firmer than ever in confidence that the Communists will be defeated. These are feelings which will comfort Father's soul in Heaven.
ref: 1980 August 1 [1980 May 1], Ching-kuo Chiang, “President Chiang Ching-kuo continues his period of mourning and finds that visits to countryside and people give him renewed strength”, in Taiwan Today, archived from the original on 17 May 2020:
text: Father, dear father
Will you be proud of me?
I wish I could be
Just like you.
ref: 2010 April 7, “My First Borrowing”, in Cécile Corbel (lyrics), Cécile Corbel and Simon Caby (music), 借りぐらし Kari-gurashi [The Borrowers] (CD), performed by Cécile Corbel, Yamaha Music Communications:
english: The Borrowers
translation: The Borrowers
text: Shepard: The bartender over there?
Liara: The matriarch hired by the asari government to track my movements?
Shepard: She's your father.
Liara: I know.
ref: 2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Apollo Cafe, Presidium Commons, Citadel:
text: Speaking to reporters at Melbourne airport, their fathers thanked supporters and praised efforts from the Australian government, according to Nine News.
ref: 2024 November 27, Jessie Yeung and Isaac Yee, “Laos detains foreign hostel staff over backpacker methanol poisonings as families and travelers demand answers”, in CNN:
text: “There was just this opportunity with a father-son dynamic to really nurture,” she said. “If the boys are starting to learn that they’re not supposed to be girls and they’re not supposed to be too much like their mothers, or too close to their mothers, then the father really can step in.”
ref: 2025 June 15, Madeline Holcombe, “How to be a dad to sons today, according to experts”, in CNN:
glosses: A male parent, especially of a human; a male who parents a child (which he has sired, adopted, fostered, taken as his own, etc.).
examples: text: My friend Tony just became a father.
glosses: A male who has sired a baby; this person in relation to his child or children.
examples: text: So Dauid ſlept with his fathers, and was buried in the citie of Dauid.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Kings 2:10:
text: Therefoꝛe it is of faith, that it might bee by grace; to the ende the pꝛomiſe might be ſure to all the ſeede, not to that onely which is of the Law, but to that alſo which is of the faith of Abꝛaham, who is the father of vs all,
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Romans 4:16:
glosses: A male ancestor more remote than a parent; a progenitor; especially, a first ancestor.
examples: text: Come, father; you can sit here.
glosses: A term of respectful address for an elderly man.
examples: text: Bless you, good father friar!
ref: c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Measure for Measure”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:
glosses: A term of respectful address for a priest.
examples: text: My brother was a father to me after my parents got divorced.
text: The child is father to the man.
text: I was a father to the pooꝛe: and the cauſe which I knewe not, I ſearched out.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Job 29:16:
text: So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and loꝛd of all his houſe, and a ruler thꝛoughout all the land of Egypt.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Genesis 45:8:
glosses: A person who plays the role of a father in some way.
examples: text: Albert Einstein is the father of modern physics.
glosses: A pioneering figure in a particular field.
examples: text: Soon after the announcement of this year's election results, Mereka said that "the father of all battles had just begun." His dispute with Muite goes back to March last year […]
ref: 1991, The Nairobi Law Monthly:
text: "If UK GDP slows by 1 per cent, there is the mother and father of all recessions. It was exciting, but very bizarre, working in such an environment."
ref: 2002, Financial Management:
text: “The Father of All Battles”
On March 23, 1991, a band of armed insurgents attacked the town of Bomaru […]
ref: 2012, Zubairu Wai, Epistemologies of African Conflicts: Violence, Evolutionism, and the War in Sierra Leone, Palgrave Macmillan, →ISBN, page 93:
glosses: Something that is the greatest or most significant of its kind.
examples: text: But may the Sun and gentle weather, / When you are both growne ripe together, / Load you with fruit, such as your Father / From you with all the joyes doth gather: / And may you when one branch is dead / Graft ſuch another in it's ſtead,[…]
ref: 1649, Richard Lovelace, Amyntor's Grove, His Chloris, Arigo, and Gratiana. An Elogie., Thomas Harper, page 88:
glosses: Something inanimate that begets.
examples: text: In proceeding in this fashion, the fathers assembled at Pisa were following the generally accepted canonistic teaching of the day […]
ref: 2003, Francis Oakley, The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism in the Catholic Church, 1300–1870, →ISBN, pages 37–8:
text: On the part of the fathers of the synod, over 50 bishops, from every continent, spoke on different ‘group forms’ of the lay apostolate, whereas about 38 fathers made their own interventions in writing to the General Secretary.
ref: 2009, Peter Chidi Okuma, Empowerment of the Catholic Laity in the Nigerian Political Situation […], →ISBN, page 177:
text: Remember that the fathers of Vatican II had rejected the first draft of the constitution on revelation entirely.
ref: 2014, Ronald D. Witherup, The Word of God at Vatican II: Exploring Dei Verbum, →ISBN, page 31:
topics: Christianity
glosses: A member of a church council.
examples: text: Three generations of file are usually kept, being the grandfather, father and son files.
ref: 2004, Ray Bradley, The Ultimate Computing Glossary for Advanced Level, page 31:
text: The file from which the father was developed with the transaction files of the appropriate day is the grandfather.
ref: 2007, O. Ray Whittington, Patrick R. Delaney, Wiley CPA Exam Review 2008: Auditing and Attestation, page 556:
topics: computing
engineering
mathematics
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
sciences
glosses: The archived older version of a file that immediately precedes the current version, and was itself derived from the grandfather.
Synonyms: sense: most significant thing
word: mother and granddaddy
word: ayr
word: ba
word: baba
word: da
word: dad
word: dada
word: daddio
word: daddy
word: father
word: Father
word: fatherling
word: old man
word: pa
word: pap
word: papa
word: papaw
word: pappaw
word: pappy
word: Pappy
word: pater
word: patriarch
word: paw
word: pawpaw
word: peepaw
word: pepaw
word: pop
word: poppa
word: poppy
word: pops
word: sire
Hypernyms: sense: a male parent
word: parent
word: guardian
word: foster
word: relative
word: man
Hyponyms: word: birth father
word: genitor
word: adoptive father
word: ballet dad
word: father-in-law
word: father-out-law
word: foster father
word: grandfather
word: stepdad
word: stepdaddy
word: stepfather
word: stepfather-in-law
Derived terms: adoptive father
All-Father
allofather
baby father
babyfather
be gathered to one's fathers
biofather
birth father
birthfather
birthing father
city father
co-father
co-father-in-law
conscript father
elderfather
eldfather
father-bother merger
Father Christmas
father confessor
fathercraft
father-daughter day
fatherdom
fatherer
fatherese
father-figure
father figure
father-fucker
fatherfucker
fatherhood
father hunger
father-in-law
father in law
fatherkin
fatherkins
fatherland
father lasher
fatherless
fatherlike
fatherline
fatherliness
fatherling
father longlegs
fatherly
fatherness
father of chapel
Father of Lies
father of the House
father of the nation
father-out-law
Father's Day
fathership
father-slayer
father superior
Father Time
father-to-be
father tongue
forefather
forthfather
foster father
founding father
father to son
gestational father
ghostly father
godfather
God the Father
gold star father
grandfather
great-grandfather
Heavenly Father
highfather
housefather
how's your father
it is a wise child that knows his own father
like father, like son
like father like son
lorefather
merfather
motherfather
nonfather
nursing father
one's father was born before one
penny-father
shrift father
shriftfather
single father
stepfather
step-father
surrogate father
unfather
wolf father
you kiss your father with that mouth
Related terms: word: Father
word: Jupiter
word: paternal
word: paterfamilias