Word.ws English Dictionary

alder

/ˈɔldɚ//ˈɔːldə/

alder noun: any of several trees or shrubs of the genus Alnus, belonging to the birch family.

Noun (1)

alder (plural alders)

  1. Any of several trees or shrubs of the genus Alnus, belonging to the birch family.
    • I’ve known ere now an interfering branch / Of alder catch my lifted axe behind me. / But that was in the woods, to hold my hand / From striking at another alder’s roots, / And that was, as I say, an alder branch.1923 October, Robert Frost, “[Notes.] The Axe-helve.”, in New Hampshire […], New York, N.Y.: Henry Holt and Company, →OCLC, page 37
    • Have a tree or two the witches particularly like, such as the alder, larch, cypress and hemlock; then, to counteract any possible evil effects, there must be a holly, yew, hazel, elder, mountain ash or juniper.1940, Rosetta E. Clarkson, Green Enchantments: The Magic Spell of Gardens, The Macmillan Company, page 273

Noun (2)

alder (plural alders)

  1. An alderman or alderwoman.
    • Almost immediately, city alders contacted the campaign to negotiate an ordinance.2004, Stephanie Luce -, Fighting for a Living Wage, page 121
    • Chicago's mayor Edward Kennelly, the city alders, and many white Chicagoans opposed this siting plan.2013, Dawn Day Biehler, Pests in the City: Flies, Bedbugs, Cockroaches, and Rats, page 180

Proper noun capitalized: Alder

UK[ˈɔː.ldə]US[ˈɑl.dɚ]

Alder (plural Alders)

  1. A topographic surname from Middle English for someone who lived by alder trees.

alder meaning in Tagalog, Arabic and Persian

alder in Tagalog

any tree or shrub of the genus Alnus
aliso

alder in Arabic

any tree or shrub of the genus Alnus
جَار الْمَاء jār al-māʔ, نَغْت naḡt

alder in Persian

any tree or shrub of the genus Alnus
توسکا tuskâ, رزدار razdâr

Examples of alder in a sentence

  • That's what the tiercel was doing when I found him again in the alder.1967, J. A. Baker, The Peregrine, page 40:
  • After three years as Ward 1 alder, Sarah Eidelson ’12 will leave city government at the end of the year.2017 September 28, Isabel Bysiewicz, “Eidelson reflects on time as alder”, in Yale Daily News:

All 21 example sentences with alder

Forms of alder

Noun
pluralalders
alternative formowler
alternative UK (dialectal)aller
Proper noun
pluralAlders
alternative formOlder

Plural of alder: alders

Origin of alder

Inherited from Middle English aldre, alder, aller, from Old English alor, from Proto-West Germanic *aluʀu, from Proto-Germanic *aluz, *alusō, *alizō, *alisō.

Clipping of alderman.

Words formed from alder

Phrases with alder

Questions about alder

What does alder mean?
Alder means any of several trees or shrubs of the genus Alnus, belonging to the birch family.
What is alder in Tagalog?
Alder in Tagalog is aliso. See Alder meaning in Tagalog.
How do you use alder in a sentence?
That's what the tiercel was doing when I found him again in the alder.
What part of speech is alder?
Alder can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce alder?
Alder is pronounced /ˈɔːldə/ (UK).
What is the plural of alder?
The plural of alder is alders.

Words near alder in the dictionary

  1. aldeias
  2. Alden
  3. Aldenham
  4. Aldenhamian
  5. Aldenhamians
  6. alder
  7. alder buckthorn
  8. alder buckthorns
  9. alder carr
  10. alder carrs
  11. alder moth

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: alder (page history and authors); Alder (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-alder.wav.

Cite this entry: “alder.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/alder. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.