Word.ws English Dictionary

manred

/ˈmænɹɪd/

manred noun: vassals collectively; the men a feudal lord can call upon in wartime.

Noun (1)

manred (countable and uncountable, plural manreds)

  1. (historical) Vassals collectively; the men a feudal lord can call upon in wartime.
    • There he was joined by his sons and addition troops, almost certainly more of the Dudley manred from the Midlands.2009, Eric William Ives, “The March on Framlingham”, in Lady Jane Grey: A Tudor Mystery, John Wiley and Sons, →ISBN, page 203
  2. (obsolete) Homage, allegiance; support of one's feudal superior.
  3. (obsolete, rare) The leader of a troop or retinue.

Noun (2)

IPA/ˈmænɹɛd/

manred (uncountable)

  1. (Celtic paganism) The primal substance of the Universe
    • They were made of the manred, that is, of the elements in the extremities of their particles and smallest atom … God was in each of the particles of the manred, […]2003, Kennth Morris, “Druidism”, in G. De Purucker, editor, Theosophical Path Magazine, January to June 1930, Kessinger Publishing, →ISBN, page 131
    • God pronounce his ineffable name, and Manred, the primal substance of the Universe, was formed. Manred was composed of thousands of teeming atoms in each of which God was present, and each was part of God.2004, Lewis Spence, “The Celtic Idea of the Origin of Man”, in An Introduction to Mythology, Cosimo, Inc, →ISBN, page 169

Forms of manred

pluralmanreds
alternative form (obsolete)mandred

Origin of manred

Inherited from Middle English manrede, manred, from Old English manrǣden (“dependence, homage, service, tribute, due”), equivalent to man + -red and a doublet of manrent. The expected Modern English form would be mandred (like kindred < Middle English kynrede), but the loss of the term from the spoken vernacular has arrested its normal phonological development (this also accounts for the pronunciation /ˈmænɹɛd/).

Borrowed from Welsh manred (“atom, mote”), formed from mân (“small”) + rhed (“course, flow”) in the 19th century.

Questions about manred

What does manred mean?
Manred means vassals collectively; the men a feudal lord can call upon in wartime.
What part of speech is manred?
Manred is a noun.
How do you pronounce manred?
Manred is pronounced /ˈmænɹɪd/.
What is the plural of manred?
The plural of manred is manreds.

Words near manred in the dictionary

  1. manquellers
  2. manquelling
  3. manqué
  4. manquée
  5. manqués
  6. manred
  7. manreds
  8. manrent
  9. manrents
  10. Manresa
  11. manriding

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: manred (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.

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