orphan
Syllables: or·phanUK/ˈɔːfən//ˈɔɹfən/
orphan noun: a person, especially a minor, both or (rarely) one of whose parents have died.
Noun
orphan (plural orphans)
- A person, especially a minor, both or (rarely) one of whose parents have died.
- Rudolf was the bold, bad Baron of traditional melodrama. Irene was young, as pretty as a picture, fresh from a music academy in England. He was the scion of an ancient noble family; she an orphan without money or friends.1956, Delano Ames, chapter 9, in Crime out of Mind
- A person, especially a minor, whose parents have permanently abandoned them.
- A young animal with no mother.
- Anything that is unsupported, as by its source, provider or caretaker, by reason of the supporter's demise or decision to abandon.
- A single line of type, beginning a paragraph, at the bottom of a column or page.
- Antonyms:
- widow
- Any unreferenced object.
- An orphan isn't harmful in a language that has garbage collection, such as Java. However, reducing the number of orphans can be expected to improve code performance.2003, David D. Riley, The Object of Data Abstraction and Structures Using Java, page 234
Adjective
orphan (not comparable)
Verb
orphan (third-person singular simple present orphans, present participle orphaning, simple past and past participle orphaned)
- To deprive of parents (used almost exclusively in the passive).
- What do you do when you come across two orphaned polar bear cubs?
- To make unavailable, as by removing the last remaining pointer or reference to.
- When you removed that image tag, you orphaned the resized icon.
- Removing categories orphans pages from the main category tree.
orphan meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
orphan in Hindi
- person whose (parent or) parents have died
- अनाथ anāth, यतीम yatīm, लावारिस lāvāris
- deprived of parents
- अनाथ anāth
orphan in Tamil
- person whose (parent or) parents have died
- அனாதை aṉātai
orphan in Marathi
- person whose (parent or) parents have died
- अनाथ मूल anāth mūl
- deprived of parents
- अनाथ anāth
orphan in Urdu
- person whose (parent or) parents have died
- یَتِیم yatīm, اَناتھ anāth
More languagesFewer languages
- orphan in Bengali
- এতিম etim
- orphan in Telugu
- అనాధ anādha
- orphan in Malayalam
- അനാഥ anātha
- orphan in Kannada
- ತಬ್ಬಲಿ, ಪರದೇಶಿ, ಬಡಪಾಯಿ, ಬೇವಾರ್ಸಿ
- orphan in Punjabi
- ਅਨਾਥ anāth, ਯਤੀਮ yatīm
- orphan in Sanskrit
- अनाथ ánāthá
- orphan in Sinhala
- අනාථ anātha
- orphan in Assamese
- মাউৰা maura
- orphan in Nepali
- अनाथ
- orphan in Pashto
- يتيم yatim, پلارمړی plārmǝṛay, مورمړی mormǝṛay
- orphan in Tagalog
- ulila
- orphan in Arabic
- يَتِيم yatīm, يَتِيمَة yatīma
- orphan in Malay
- anak yatim
- orphan in Indonesian
- yatim, anak piatu, anak yatim piatu
- orphan in Persian
- یَتیم yatim
- orphan in Thai
- เด็กกำพร้า dèk gam-práa
- orphan in Vietnamese
- trẻ mồ côi, cô nhi
- orphan in Myanmar
- မိဘမဲ့ mi.bha.mai.
Examples of orphan in a sentence
- His story is a mirror into the life of orphans growing up.
- When they saw the poor orphans, they were overwhelmed with tenderness for them.
- I found an orphaned project, half-completed before its author quit, and decided to finish it.
Antonyms of orphan
Forms of orphan
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | orphans |
| alternative form (obsolete) | orphane |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | orphans |
| present participle | orphaning |
| past participle | orphaned |
| past | orphaned |
| second-person singular present (archaic) | orphanest |
| second-person singular past (archaic) | orphanedst |
| third-person singular present (archaic) | orphaneth |
Origin of orphan
Late Middle English, from Late Latin orphanus, from Ancient Greek ὀρφανός (orphanós, “without parents, fatherless”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃órbʰos. PIE word *h₃órbʰos Cognate with Sanskrit अर्भ (árbha), Latin orbus (“orphaned”), Old Armenian որբ (orb, “orphan”), Old High German erbi, arbi (German Erbe (“heir”)), Old English ierfa (“heir”). More at erf.
Words formed from orphan
- deorphanized
- double orphan
- elder orphan
- half orphan
- half-orphan
- maternal orphan
- nonorphan
- orphanage
- orphanarium
- orphan asylum
- orphan-crushing machine
- orphancy
- orphan disease
- orphandom
- orphan drug
- orphaner
- orphanet
- orphanhood
- orphan house
- orphan initialism
- orphanish
- orphanism
- orphanity
- orphanize
- orphan John
- orphanlike
- orphan medicine
- orphanotrophism
- orphanotrophy
- orphan page
- orphan receptor
- orphanry
- orphanship
- orphan source
- orphan star
- orphan tears
- orphan train
- orphany
- paper orphan
- paternal orphan
- social orphan
- war orphan
- orphan work
- orphan acronym
- orphan off
Phrases with orphan
- orphan drugs
- orphan pages
- orphan stars
- orphan works
- orphan houses
- orphan trains
- orphan asylums
- orphan sources
- orphan acronyms
- orphan diseases
- orphan medicines
- orphan receptors
4 more phrasesFewer phrases
Words that rhyme with orphan
Questions about orphan
- What does orphan mean?
- Orphan means a person, especially a minor, both or (rarely) one of whose parents have died.
- What is orphan in Hindi?
- Orphan in Hindi is अनाथ (anāth), यतीम (yatīm), लावारिस (lāvāris). See Orphan meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is orphan?
- Orphan can be a noun, an adjective or a verb.
- How do you pronounce orphan?
- Orphan is pronounced /ˈɔːfən/ (UK).
- What is the plural of orphan?
- The plural of orphan is orphans.
Words near orphan in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: orphan (page history and authors); orphan (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); মাউৰা (Assamese) (page history and authors); orphan (Nepali, 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: en-us-orphan.ogg.
Cite this entry: “orphan.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/orphan. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.