Word.ws English Dictionary

Galen

UK/ˈɡeɪlən/

Galen proper noun: aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus, a Roman and Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher (129 – c. 216 CE).

galen: aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus, a Roman and Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher (129 – c....
Image: Georg Paul Busch (engraver), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Proper noun (1)

Galen

  1. Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus, a Roman and Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher (129 – c. 216 CE).
  2. A male given name from Ancient Greek, of mostly American usage.

Noun

Galen (plural Galens)

  1. A physician.
    • It has been computed, that by intrusting a well-concocted and tolerably interesting lie, in strictest confidence, to two fashionable Galens, in full practice, and four determined morning visitors or levee haunters, the story will reach 7,963 individuals in the course of four-and-twenty hours,—[…]1832 November 24, “Gossip”, in Weston Hatfield, editor, Huntingdon, Bedford, & Peterborough Gazette, and Cambridge and Hertford Independent Press, volume XXII, number 1,058, Cambridge...
    • It was well known at Barchester, and very well known to Dr. Fillgrave, […] the Barchester Galen, that the great railway contractor was ill.1858, Anthony Trollope, “When Greek Meets Greek Then Comes the Tug of War”, in Doctor Thorne. […], volume I, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, page 242

Proper noun (2)

Galen (plural Galens)

  1. A surname.

Galen meaning in Arabic and Persian

Galen in Arabic

Roman and Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher
جَالِينُوس jālīnūs

Galen in Persian

Roman and Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher
جالینوس jâlinus
More languagesFewer languages
Kashmiri
جٲلیٖنوٗس jạ̄līnūs

Forms of Galen

Noun
pluralGalens
Proper noun
pluralGalens

Origin of Galen

From Middle English Galen, from Latin Galēnus, from Ancient Greek Γαληνός (Galēnós), from γαλήνη (galḗnē, “calm, tranquillity”).

* A reduced form of Dutch van Galen. * A variant of Galyon or Gallon.

Questions about Galen

What does Galen mean?
Galen means aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus, a Roman and Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher (129 – c. 216 CE).
What is Galen in Arabic?
Galen in Arabic is جَالِينُوس (jālīnūs). See Galen meaning in Arabic.
What part of speech is Galen?
Galen can be a proper noun or a noun.
How do you pronounce Galen?
Galen is pronounced /ˈɡeɪlən/ (UK).

Words near Galen in the dictionary

  1. galeiform
  2. galeite
  3. galelike
  4. Galemance
  5. Galemancer
  6. Galen
  7. galena
  8. galenas
  9. Galenian
  10. galenic
  11. galenical

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Galen (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.

Last updated:

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