Word.ws English Dictionary

sin eater

sin eater noun: a person (usually a man) who is supposed to take sins of a deceased person upon himself by eating a piece of bread or other food laid on or passed across the breast of the corpse.

Noun

sin eater (plural sin eaters)

  1. (historical) A person (usually a man) who is supposed to take sins of a deceased person upon himself by eating a piece of bread or other food laid on or passed across the breast of the corpse.
    • A Loafe of bread was brought out, and delivered to the Sinne-eater over the corps.1687, John Aubrey, Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme, page 35

Forms of sin eater

pluralsin eaters
alternative formsin-eater

Questions about sin eater

What does sin eater mean?
Sin eater means a person (usually a man) who is supposed to take sins of a deceased person upon himself by eating a piece of bread or other food laid on or passed across the breast of the corpse.
What part of speech is sin eater?
Sin eater is a noun.
What is the plural of sin eater?
The plural of sin eater is sin eaters.

Words near sin eater in the dictionary

  1. sin bin
  2. sin binned
  3. sin binning
  4. sin bins
  5. Sin City
  6. sin eater
  7. sin eaters
  8. sin eating
  9. sin money
  10. sin moneys
  11. sin offering

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sin eater (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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