old man
old man noun: an elderly man.
Noun
old man (countable and uncountable, plural old men)
- An elderly man.
- One's father.
- He smacked me around some. Didn't everybody's old man?
- One of her companions - a lanky youth with a Beatle-cut hairdo - hammered in a pin with the flat of his hand and hissed: "That's for the old man - he wouldn't let me use the car tonight."1965, Attila Zohar, Kings Cross Black Magic, Sydney: Horwitz Publications, page 67
- Antonyms:
- old lady
- A husband, or male significant other, irrespective of age.
- “[…] Now if that thing is balling—and your old lady or your old man is off somewhere flashing and doesn't want to be touched—well, you get put down on acid, you can be on a bummer for months.”1968, Joan Didion, “Slouching Towards Bethlehem”, in Slouching Towards Bethlehem
- I was going through my old man’s pockets this morning1974, Shirley Brown, “Woman to Woman”, in Woman to Woman
- One's male employer, irrespective of age.
- A unit's commanding officer, or the commander of a naval vessel, irrespective of age.
- An Australian Aboriginal elder.
- Big Paddy nursed his grief in a quiet, mad fury. Then he urged the Old Men to ‘sing out’ those responsible for the death of his son.1937, Ion L. Idriess, Over the Range, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, published 1947, page 26
- Term of address for a male friend, irrespective of age.
- “Don't mention it, old man,” I responded courteously.1934 October 5, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, Right Ho, Jeeves, London: Herbert Jenkins […], →OCLC
- 'Coming up, coming up, coming up,' Pop said. 'There you are, Charley, old man. Larkin Special. Don't ask what's in it. Don't stare at it. Don't think. Just drink it down. In ten minutes you'll feel perfick again.'1958, H. E. Bates, The Darling Buds of May
- Synonym of Old Adam.
- Synonyms:
- Old Adam
- Synonym of southernwood.
- Synonyms:
- southernwood
- The state of human nature without the spiritual transformation brought about by redemption through Jesus Christ.
- A new light has entered into the life and transformed it wonderfully, the soul has been born again, the old man has been put off, the new man which is akin to Jesus Christ has been put on.1906 [1890 November], Richard Acland Armstrong, “What must I do to be saved?”, in George Gilbert Armstrong, editor, Richard Acland Armstrong: A Memoir, Green, page 155
- Used attributively to denote something of exceptional size, strength, age etc.
- ‘You watch out for them old man brown snakes in here. I seen a shed skin back there in the hall.’2002, Alex Miller, Journey to the Stone Country, Allen & Unwin, published 2003, page 177
Proper noun capitalized: Old Man
Old Man
- A title given to the personification of a force of nature or abstract concept, such as Old Man Winter or Old Man River.
- But it was really Old Man Concentration and his partner, Co-operation, that put across the big clean-up.1919, The American Produce Review, volume 47, page 773
- Big-Horn hadn't been told whom he was to fight, and when he found that it was Old Man Coyote, he was disappointed.2019, Thornton Burgess, Old Mother West Wind Collection, page 471
- A creator god in some Native American mythologies.
- The Wiyot say that Condor recreated mankind after Old Man wiped out humanity with a flood.2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, page 249
- Ellipsis of Old Man of Coniston.
old man meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Telugu and Malayalam
old man in Hindi
- elderly man
- बूढ़ा būṛhā, शेख़ śex, शैख़ śaix
old man in Urdu
- elderly man
- بُوڑھا būṛhā, بُڈّھا buḍḍhā, پِیر مَرْد pīr mard, شَیخ śaix, شیخ śex
old man in Telugu
- elderly man
- వృద్ధుడు vr̥ddhuḍu
old man in Malayalam
- elderly man
- വയസ്സൻ vayassaṉ, വൃദ്ധൻ vr̥ddhaṉ, വയോധികന് vayōdhikaṉ
More languagesFewer languages
- old man in Tagalog
- manong
- old man in Arabic
- شَيْخ šayḵ, عَجُوز ʕajūz
- old man in Indonesian
- pak tua
- old man in Thai
- ชายชรา chaai-chá-raa, ตาแก่ dtaa-gɛ̀ɛ, ลุง lung, แปะ bpɛ̀
- old man in Vietnamese
- ông già
- old man in Myanmar
- အဘိုးကြီး a.bhui:kri:, အဘိုးအို a.bhui:ui
Examples of old man in a sentence
- ‘I use the same back-hand flip me old man useda use to knock me old lady arse-over-’ead an’ Stiffer than Mo.’1982, Paul Radley, My Blue-Checker Corker and Me, Sydney: Fontana/Collins, page 97:
- See, my old man's got a problem / He lives with a bottle, that's the way it is1988, Tracy Chapman, “Fast Car”:
- Maybe you could pass the paper bag and the comb test, but your old man had dark skin, kinky hair, and he was a dyed-in-the-wool baptist from out in the sticks."2002 February, Don Spears, Playing for Keeps, Los Angeles: Milligan Books, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 183:
Synonyms of old man
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Antonyms
Forms of old man
| plural | old men |
|---|---|
| alternative form | oldman |
| alternative form | old-man |
Origin of old man
From Middle English alde mann, aldman, elde man, oldeman, from Old English eald man.
Words formed from old man
Questions about old man
- What does old man mean?
- Old man means an elderly man.
- What is old man in Hindi?
- Old man in Hindi is बूढ़ा (būṛhā), शेख़ (śex), शैख़ (śaix). See Old man meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use old man in a sentence?
- ‘I use the same back-hand flip me old man useda use to knock me old lady arse-over-’ead an’ Stiffer than Mo.’
- What part of speech is old man?
- Old man can be a noun or a proper noun.
- What is the plural of old man?
- The plural of old man is old men.
Words near old man in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: old man (page history and authors); Old Man (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:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-old man.ogg.
Cite this entry: “old man.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/old_man. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.