bier
pronunciation
How to pronounce bier in British English:
UK [bɪə(r)]
How to pronounce bier in American English:
US [bɪr]
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- Noun:
- a coffin along with its stand
- a stand to support a corpse or a coffin prior to burial
Word Origin
- bier
- bier: [OE] Etymologically, a bier is ‘something used for carrying’. It comes from West Germanic *bērō, a derivative of the same base (*ber-) as produced the verb bear. Its Old English form was bēr, and it was not spelled with an i until the 16th century. The original general sense ‘framework for carrying something’ (which it shares with the etymologically related barrow) died out around 1600, but already by about 1000 the modern specific meaning ‘stand for a coffin’ had developed.=> barrow, bear
- bier (n.)
- Old English bær (West Saxon), ber (Anglian) "handbarrow, litter, bed," from West Germanic *bero (cognates: Old Saxon, Old High German bara, Old Frisian bere, Middle Dutch bare, Dutch baar, German Bahre "bier"), from PIE root *bher- (1) "to carry; to bear children," and thus related to the Old English verb beran "to bear" (see bear (v.)), making a bier etymologically anything used for carrying, only later limited to funerary sense. Since c. 1600, spelling influenced by French bière, from Old French biere, from Frankish *bera, from the same Germanic root.
Example
- 1. Today at good cheer , tomorrow on the bier .
- 2. He began to wail like a man at a bier .
- 3. They deposited the supposed corpse on the bier .
- 4. Daughters of the longer , the water bier hollywood star .
- 5. A decorated bier on which a coffin rests in state during a funeral .