laird
/lɛːd//lɛəɹd/
laird noun: a feudal lord in Scottish contexts.
Noun
laird (plural lairds)
- A feudal lord in Scottish contexts.
- An aristocrat, particularly in Scottish contexts and in reference to the chiefs of the Scottish clans.
- Now Wiſe, and Rich, and Worthie, and Wonderful, and Faithful and True, and Rare, & Charitable, and Great Laird of Carnwath, Be not Prowd, altho I Commend you at ſuch a Rate behind your back and yet never ſaw You...1712 January 1, [William Mitchel], The Tinklars Speech to the Most Loyal Country-man, the Honourable Laird of Carnwath, [Edinburgh?]: [s.n.], →OCLC, page 2
- Once I was call'd a great Fife laird,
I dwelt not far from the Hall-yard:
[...]
O! but it's long and many a year,
Since laſt my feet did travel here.
I find great change in old lairds places,
I know the ground, but not the faces,
Where ſhall I turn me firſt about,
For my acquaintance is worn out?1751, “The Speech of a Fife Laird, Newly Come from the Grave”, in The Speech of a Fife Laird Newly Come from the Grave. The Mare of Collingtoun. The Banishment of Poverty. Three Scots Poems, Glasgow...
- A landowner, particularly in Scottish contexts.
- In Scotland, the traditional term for the owner of an upland estate is the ‘laird’. [...] Well into the post-war period, the lairds of large estates were generally treated deferentially by local people but times have changed, [...] It would be a mistake to equate the title ‘laird’ to a British...2013, Jayne Glass, Alister Scott, Martin F. Price, Charles Warren, “Sustainability in the Uplands: Introducing Key Concepts”, in Jayne Glass, Martin F. Price, Charles Warren, Alister Scott, editors...
Verb
laird (third-person singular simple present lairds, present participle lairding, simple past and past participle lairded)
- Chiefly as laird it over: to behave like a laird, particularly to act haughtily or to domineer; to lord (it over).
- But cauld was his hearth ere his youdith was o'er, / An' he delved on the lands he had lairded before; / Yet though he beggared his ha' an' deserted his lea, / Contented he roamed on the banks o' the Dee.1874, George Outram, “The Banks o’ the Dee”, in Henry Glassford Bell, editor, Lyrics Legal and Miscellaneous, 2nd edition, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood & Sons, →OCLC, page 86
- You'd stand with a single malt, / in braces, admiring a Grinling, / while I did a fingertip search of your face, / [...] / discovering the recesses of baronial you, / lairding it in a rental estate / we were about to lose.2008, Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch, “A Pair of Antlers”, in Not in Those Shoes, London: Picador, →ISBN, page 21
Proper noun capitalized: Laird
Laird
- A surname.
- A township and village in Algoma District, northern Ontario.
- A rural municipality, the Rural Municipality of Laird No. 404, in central Saskatchewan.
- A village within the rural municipality in Saskatchewan, named after David Laird.
- A census-designated place in Yuma County, Colorado.
- A township in Houghton County, Michigan.
- A township in Phelps County, Nebraska.
laird meaning in Urdu, Telugu and Malayalam
laird in Urdu
- وڈیرا, زمین دار
laird in Telugu
- లేర్డ్, లైర్డ్
laird in Malayalam
- ലൈർഡ്
Examples of laird in a sentence
- Though now entered on the stage of glorious war, the young Laird of Dalbracken remained still the same imaginative and sensitive being who dreamed and loved in the scenes of his boyhood.1848, [James Kirkland], chapter XV, in The Eerie Laird: Being the Only Authentic History of the Person so Called by Tradition in Scotland...
- Lowland lairds allied themselves with Highland chiefs, along with Edinburgh and Glasgow burghers who worried about having to compete for markets with English merchants.2001, Arthur [L.] Herman, “A Trap of Their Own Making”, in How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The True Story of How Europe’s Poorest...
- He loved to unnerve his lairding brother.2013, Victoria Roberts, chapter 18, in X Marks the Scot, Naperville, Ill.: Sourcebooks Casablanca, →ISBN, page 194:
Forms of laird
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | lairds |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | lairds |
| present participle | lairding |
| past participle | lairded |
| past | lairded |
Origin of laird
The noun is borrowed from Scots laird, from northern or Scottish Middle English lard, laverd, a variant of lord. The verb is derived from the noun. Doublet of hlaford and lord.
Words formed from laird
- bonnet laird
- lairdess
- lairdie
- lairdly
- lairdocracy
- lairdship
- tipsy laird
Words that rhyme with laird
Questions about laird
- What does laird mean?
- Laird means a feudal lord in Scottish contexts.
- What is laird in Urdu?
- Laird in Urdu is وڈیرا, زمین دار. See Laird meaning in Urdu.
- How do you use laird in a sentence?
- Though now entered on the stage of glorious war, the young Laird of Dalbracken remained still the same imaginative and sensitive being who dreamed and loved in the scenes of his boyhood.
- What part of speech is laird?
- Laird can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce laird?
- Laird is pronounced /lɛːd/ (UK).
- What is the plural of laird?
- The plural of laird is lairds.
Words near laird in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: laird (page history and authors); Laird (page history and authors); laird (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); laird (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); laird (Malayalam, 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-laird.wav, En-us-laird.oga.
Cite this entry: “laird.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/laird. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.