Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A newly married man who was previously considered a confirmed bachelor.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Blessed; benign; salutary; especially, in medicine, having mild and salubrious qualities: as, “medicines that are benedict,”
  • noun A sportive name for a newly married man, especially one who has been long a bachelor, or who has been in the habit of ridiculing marriage.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A married man, or a man newly married.
  • adjective obsolete Having mild and salubrious qualities.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun rare A newly married man, especially one who was previously a confirmed bachelor.
  • adjective obsolete Having mild and salubrious qualities.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun Italian monk who founded the Benedictine order about 540 (480-547)
  • noun United States anthropologist (1887-1948)
  • noun a newly married man (especially one who has long been a bachelor)

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[After Benedick, a character in Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Benedicke (a variant of Benedict), a character in William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, 1598.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Latin benedictus, past participle of benedicere ("to bless"). See benison, and compare bennet.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word benedict.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • (noun) - A married man. From Benedict, the husband of Beatrice, in Much Ado About Nothing.

    --James Maitland's American Slang Dictionary, 1891

    January 16, 2018