Word.ws English Dictionary

friar

/ˈfɹaɪə/US/ˈfɹaɪɚ/

friar noun: a member of a mendicant Christian order such as the Augustinians, Carmelites (white friars), Franciscans (grey friars) or the Dominicans (black friars).

Noun

friar (plural friars)

  1. A member of a mendicant Christian order such as the Augustinians, Carmelites (white friars), Franciscans (grey friars) or the Dominicans (black friars).
    Synonyms:
    brother, frater
  2. (dated) A white or pale patch on a printed page caused by poor inking.
  3. An American fish, the silverside.
    1. Such fish prepared as food.

Proper noun capitalized: Friar

Friar (plural Friars)

  1. A surname.

friar meaning in Tamil, Marathi, Urdu and Malayalam

friar in Tamil

துறவி

friar in Marathi

फ्रियर

friar in Urdu

راہب

friar in Malayalam

ക്രിസ്ത്യൻ സന്ന്യാസിസഭാംഗം, കത്തോലിക്കാ സന്യാസി
More languagesFewer languages
friar in Gujarati
ફ્રિયર
friar in Tagalog
frayle

Synonyms of friar

Forms of friar

Noun
pluralfriars
alternative form (obsolete)frier
alternative form (obsolete)fryar
Proper noun
pluralFriars

Plural of friar: friars

Origin of friar

Inherited from Middle English frere, borrowed from Old French frere, from Latin frāter, from Proto-Italic *frātēr, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰréh₂tēr. Doublet of bhai, brother, bru, frater, pal, and vai.

Words formed from friar

Phrases with friar

Words that rhyme with friar

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about friar

What does friar mean?
Friar means a member of a mendicant Christian order such as the Augustinians, Carmelites (white friars), Franciscans (grey friars) or the Dominicans (black friars).
What is friar in Tamil?
Friar in Tamil is துறவி. See Friar meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is friar?
Friar can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce friar?
Friar is pronounced /ˈfɹaɪə/ (UK).
What is the plural of friar?
The plural of friar is friars.

Words near friar in the dictionary

  1. friaje
  2. friajes
  3. friand
  4. friands
  5. Friant
  6. friar
  7. friar bird
  8. friar birds
  9. Friar Minor
  10. Friar Minors
  11. Friar Preacher

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: friar (page history and authors); Friar (page history and authors); friar (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); friar (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); friar (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); friar (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); friar (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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.

Last updated:

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

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