free

Meanings

Adjective

• Unconstrained.
• Obtainable without any payment.
• Unconstrained.
• Unconstrained.
• Without; not containing (what is specified); exempt; clear; liberated.
• Ready; eager; acting without spurring or whipping; spirited.
• Invested with a particular freedom or franchise; enjoying certain immunities or privileges; admitted to special rights; followed by of.
• Certain or honourable; the opposite of base.
• Privileged or individual; the opposite of common.

Adverb

• Without needing to pay.
• Freely; willingly.

Verb

• To make free; set at liberty; release.
• To rid of something that confines or oppresses.

Noun

• Abbreviation of free kick
• free transfer
• The usual means of restarting play after a foul is committed, where the non-offending team restarts from where the foul was committed.
• the freestyle stroke

Related

Similar words

• befree
• emancipate
• let loose
• liberate
• manumit
• release
• unchain
• unfetter
• unshackle

Opposite words

• unfree

Narrower meaning words

• -free

Origin

• From Middle English free, fre, freo, from Old English frēo ("free"), from Proto-West Germanic *frī, from Proto-Germanic *frijaz ("beloved, not in bondage"), from Proto-Indo-European *priHós ("dear, beloved"), from *preyH-. Related to friend. Cognate with West Frisian frij ("free"), Dutch vrij ("free"), Low German free ("free"), German frei ("free"), Danish, Swedish and Norwegian fri ("free"), Sanskrit प्रिय.
• Germanic and Celtic are the only Indo-European language branches in which the PIE word with the meaning of "dear, beloved" acquired the additional meaning of "free" in the sense of "not in bondage". This was an extension of the idea of "characteristic of those who are dear and beloved", in other words friends and tribe members (in contrast to unfree inhabitants from other tribes and prisoners of war, many of which were among the slaves – compare the Latin use of liberi to mean both "free persons" and "children of a family").
• The verb comes from Middle English freen, freoȝen, from Old English frēon, frēoġan, from Proto-West Germanic *frijōn, from Proto-Germanic *frijōną, from Proto-Indo-European *preyH-.