Word.ws English Dictionary

sibyl

/ˈsɪ.bəl/

sibyl noun: a pagan female oracle or prophetess, especially the Cumaean sibyl.

sibyl: a pagan female oracle or prophetess, especially the Cumaean sibyl
Image: Michelangelo, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

sibyl (plural sibyls)

  1. A pagan female oracle or prophetess, especially the Cumaean sibyl.
    • A Sybill that had numbred in the world
      The Sun to courſe, two hundred compaſſes,
      In her Prophetticke furie ſow'd the Worke:c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
    • "Are you very anxious," asked he, "to consult the sibyl?" "Nay," replied Francesea; "I want faith." "You will," replied he, "nevertheless be amused with Madame de I'Hôpital's tact; she knows enough of the history of the individuals around to give a shrewd guess at the favourite fantasy of each, and...1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter V, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 45

Proper noun capitalized: Sibyl

Sibyl

  1. A female given name from Ancient Greek.
    • Be she as foul as Florentius' love, / As old as Sibyl, and as curst and shrewd / As Socrates' Xanthippe, or worse, / She moves me not., Scene II
  2. Alternative letter-case form of sibyl.

Forms of sibyl

Noun
pluralsibyls
alternative formSibyl
alternative formSybill
Proper noun
alternative formSybil
alternative form (rare)Cybil
alternative form (rare)Cybill

Origin of sibyl

From Latin Sibylla, from Ancient Greek Σίβυλλα (Síbulla).

Latin Sibylla, Ancient Greek Σίβυλλα (Síbulla, “sibyl”), name of ancient Greek prophetesses.

Words formed from sibyl

Questions about sibyl

What does sibyl mean?
Sibyl means a pagan female oracle or prophetess, especially the Cumaean sibyl.
What part of speech is sibyl?
Sibyl can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce sibyl?
Sibyl is pronounced /ˈsɪ.bəl/.
What is the plural of sibyl?
The plural of sibyl is sibyls.

Words near sibyl in the dictionary

  1. Sibulan
  2. Sibutad
  3. sibutramine
  4. Sibuyan
  5. Sibuyan Sea
  6. sibyl
  7. sibylic
  8. Sibylla
  9. sibyllic
  10. sibylline
  11. sibyllist

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sibyl (page history and authors); Sibyl (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Yangolin-sibyl.wav.

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