body

pronunciation

How to pronounce body in British English: UK [ˈbɒdi] word uk audio image

How to pronounce body in American English: US [ˈbɑːdi] word us audio image

Noun:

the entire physical structure of an organism (especially an animal or human being)
body of a dead animal or person
a group of persons associated by some common tie or occupation and regarded as an entity
the body excluding the head and neck and limbs
an individual 3-dimensional object that has mass and that is distinguishable from other objects
a collection of particulars considered as a system
the external structure of a vehicle
the property of holding together and retaining its shape
the central message of a communication
Verb:

invest with or as with a body; give body to

Word Origin

body: body: [OE] For a word so central to people’s perception of themselves, body is remarkably isolated linguistically. Old High German had potah ‘body’, traces of which survived dialectally into modern times, but otherwise it is without known relatives in any other Indo- European language. Attempts have been made, not altogether convincingly, to link it with words for ‘container’ or ‘barrel’, such as medieval Latin butica. The use of body to mean ‘person in general’, as in somebody, nobody, got fully under way in the 14th century.

body (n.): Old English bodig "trunk, chest" (of a man or animal); related to Old High German botah, of unknown origin. Not elsewhere in Germanic, and the word has died out in German (replaced by leib, originally "life," and körper, from Latin). In English, extension to "person" is from late 13c. Meaning "main part" of anything was in late Old English, hence its use in reference to vehicles (1520s). Contrasted with soul since at least mid-13c. Meaning "corpse" (short for dead body) is from late 13c. Transferred to matter generally in Middle English (as in heavenly body, late 14c.). Body politic "the nation, the state" first recorded 1520s, legalese, with French word order. Body image was coined 1935. Body language is attested from 1967, perhaps from French langage corporel (1966). Phrase over my dead body attested by 1833.