Wiktionary

city

See also: City

English Edit

 
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Alternative forms Edit

Etymology Edit

From Middle English city, citie, citee, cite, from Old French cité, from Latin cīvitās (“citizenry; community; a city with its hinterland”), from cīvis (“native; townsman; citizen”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱey- (“to lie down, settle; home, family; love; beloved”).

Cognate with Old English hīwan pl (“members of one's household, servants”). See hewe. Doublet of civitas.

Mostly displaced native Old English burg, burh, whence Modern English borough.

Pronunciation Edit

 
Part of New York City, a large city with many tall buildings.
 
Despite its small size, Wells is a city because of its cathedral.

Noun Edit

city (plural cities)

  1. A large settlement, bigger than a town; sometimes with a specific legal definition, depending on the place.
    São Paulo is the largest city in South America.
    • c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], page 147, column 2:
      Ah, knovv you not the Citie fauours them, / And they haue troupes of Souldiers at their beck?
    • 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter IV, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
      So this was my future home, I thought! […] Backed by towering hills, the but faintly discernible purple line of the French boundary off to the southwest, a sky of palest Gobelin flecked with fat, fleecy little clouds, it in truth looked a dear little city; the city of one's dreams.
    • 2014 June 14, “It's a gas”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8891:
      One of the hidden glories of Victorian engineering is proper drains. Isolating a city’s effluent and shipping it away in underground sewers has probably saved more lives than any medical procedure except vaccination.
    • 2020 July 15, Mike Brown talks to Paul Clifton, “Leading London's "hidden heroes"”, in Rail, page 42:
      All our stations have changed. We have to constrain numbers. We have to mandate face coverings. These are massive changes in what is a public transport city. This is not a car city.
  2. (UK) A settlement granted special status by royal charter or letters patent; traditionally, a settlement with a cathedral regardless of size.
    • 1976, Cornelius P. Darcy, The Encouragement of the Fine Arts in Lancashire, 1760-1860, Manchester University Press, →ISBN, page 20:
      Manchester, incorporated in 1838, was made the centre of a bishopric in 1847 and became a city in 1853. Liverpool was transformed into a city by Royal Charter when the new diocese of Liverpool was created in 1880.
    • 2014, Graham Rutt, Cycling Britain's Cathedrals Volume 1, Lulu.com, →ISBN, page 307:
      St Davids itself is the smallest city in Great Britain, with a population of less than 2,000.
  3. (Australia) The central business district; downtown.
    I'm going into the city today to do some shopping.
  4. (slang) A large amount of something (used after the noun).
    It’s video game city in here!

Hypernyms Edit

Derived terms Edit

Place names ending in City

Pages starting with “city”.

Related terms Edit

Descendants Edit

  • → French: City
  • → German: City
  • → Italian: city
  • → Swedish: city
  • → Russian: си́ти (síti)

Translations Edit

central business district — see central business district
downtown — see downtown

See also Edit

Further reading Edit

  • "city" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 55.

Anagrams Edit

Czech Edit

Pronunciation Edit

Noun Edit

city

  1. nominative/accusative/vocative/instrumental plural of cit

Italian Edit

Etymology Edit

Unadapted borrowing from English city. Doublet of città.

Pronunciation Edit

Noun Edit

city f (invariable)

  1. city (financial district of a city)

Derived terms Edit

References Edit

  1. ^ city in Luciano Canepari, Dizionario di Pronuncia Italiana (DiPI)

Middle English Edit

Noun Edit

city

  1. Alternative form of cite

Swedish Edit

Etymology Edit

Borrowed from English city.

Pronunciation Edit

Noun Edit

city n

  1. inner city, the commercial centre of a medium-sized or larger city
    Lite närmare city, i närheten av konstmuseet, ligger Norrköpings mest attraktiva lägenheter.
    A little closer to the town centre, next to the art museum, you'll find Norrköping's most attractive apartments.
    Det finns mycket att förbättra i vårt city.
    There are many things that need improvement in our inner city.

Usage notes Edit

  • centrum is used for the commercial centre of suburbs and small or medium-sized towns.

Synonyms Edit

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