grown-up

See also: grownup and grown up

Contents

English

Alternative forms

• grownup
• grown up

Adjective

grown-up (comparative more grown-up, superlative most grown-up)

1. Of, pertaining to, or suitable for adults.
2. Having a mature outlook.

Noun

grown-up (plural grown-ups)

1. An adult. (used especially by children)
   • 1909, Archibald Marshall [pseudonym; Arthur Hammond Marshall], chapter I, in The Squire’s Daughter, London: Methuen, OCLC 12026604; republished New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1919, OCLC 491297620:

     They stayed together during three dances, went out on to the terrace, explored wherever they were permitted to explore, paid two visits to the buffet, and enjoyed themselves much in the same way as if they had been school-children surreptitiously breaking loose from an assembly of grown-ups.

Translations

adult

• Italian: adulto (it) m

References

• Compact Oxford English Dictionary
• American Heritage Dictionary

Anagrams

• upgrown