broad

Meanings

Adjective

• Wide in extent or scope.
• Extended, in the sense of diffused; open; clear; full.
• Having a large measure of any thing or quality; unlimited; unrestrained.
• Comprehensive; liberal; enlarged.
• Plain; evident.
• General rather than specific.
• Unsubtle; obvious.
• Free; unrestrained; unconfined.
• Gross; coarse; indelicate.
• Strongly regional.
• Velarized, i.e. not palatalized.

Noun

• A shallow lake, one of a number of bodies of water in eastern Norfolk and Suffolk.
• A lathe tool for turning down the insides and bottoms of cylinders.
• A British gold coin worth 20 shillings, issued by the Commonwealth of England in 1656.
• A kind of floodlight.
• A prostitute, a woman of loose morals.
• A woman or girl.

Related

Opposite words

• thin, narrow
• skinny
• slender

Origin

• From Middle English brood, brode, from Old English brād, from Proto-West Germanic *braid, from Proto-Germanic *braidaz, of uncertain origin. Cognate with Scots braid ("broad"), West Frisian breed ("broad"), Saterland Frisian breed ("broad"), Low German breed ("broad"), breet, Dutch breed ("broad"), German breit ("broad, wide"), Danish, Swedish and Norwegian Bokmål bred ("broad"), Norwegian brei ("broad"), Icelandic breiður ("broad, wide").
• Early 20th century. Said to be from abroadwife, "woman who lives or travels without her husband", though it might be in part an alteration of bride, especially through influence of cognate German Braut, which is used in the same sense of “broad, young woman, hussy”. Compare Middle High German brūt.