herm

/ˈhɜːm/US/ˈhɜɹm/

herm noun: a rectangular pillar bearing a bust of Hermes, once used as a boundary marker and later as decoration. Also the clipping of hermaphrodite.

Image: Unknown (original by Polyeuktos), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

herm (plural herms)

A rectangular pillar bearing a bust of Hermes, once used as a boundary marker and later as decoration.

Proper noun capitalized: Herm

Herm

One of the Channel Islands and part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey.
A commune in the Landes department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in south-western France.

Also used as

herm is also the clipping of hermaphrodite.

Forms of herm

plural	herms

Origin of herm

Learned borrowing from Latin Herma, a Latinization of Hermēs, from Ancient Greek Ἑρμῆς (Hermês).

Perhaps from Old Norse armr (“arm”), because of its shape.

Words formed from herm

hermie
merm

Words that rhyme with herm

9 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about herm

What does herm mean?: Herm means a rectangular pillar bearing a bust of Hermes, once used as a boundary marker and later as decoration.
What part of speech is herm?: Herm can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce herm?: Herm is pronounced /ˈhɜːm/ (UK).
What is the plural of herm?: The plural of herm is herms.

Words near herm in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: herm (page history and authors); Herm (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: 2026-09-02

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

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