communes

Noun

commune (countable and uncountable, plural communes)

1. A small community, often rural, whose members share in the ownership of property, and in the division of labour; the members of such a community.
   • The town of Chu-chou in Hunan Province, carrying out the great directive of Chairman Mao that "educated youths must go to the villages," has put into practice factory-commune links, and under the leadership of cadres, has made a collective settlement of educated youths in commune and brigade farms...1975, Peter J. Seybolt, editor, The Rustication of Urban Youth in China, published 2015, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 148
2. A local political division in many European countries as well as their former colonies (such as Chile and Vietnam).
3. (obsolete) The commonalty; the common people.
4. (obsolete, uncountable) Communion; sympathetic conversation between friends.
   • For days of happy commune dead.1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “(please specify |part=Prologue or Epilogue, or |canto=I to CXXIX)”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC
5. (historical) A self-governing city or league of citizens.
   • In 1117 the commune and archbishop had separate consuls at Milan.1997, David Nicholas, The Growth of the Medieval City: From Late Antiquity to the Early Fourteenth Century, →ISBN, page 161

See all 8 meanings of commune