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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

abut.

To touch by means of a mutual border, edge or end; to border on; to lie adjacent (to); to be contiguous (said of an area of land)

4 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

verb/əˈbʌt/Received-Pronunciation/əˈbʌt/US/əˈbʊt/Northern-England
  1. To touch by means of a mutual border, edge or end; to border on; to lie adjacent (to); to be contiguous (said of an area of land)

    intransitive
    It was a time when Germany still abutted upon Russia.
    His land abuts on the road.
  2. To border upon; be next to; abut on; be adjacent to.

    transitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English abutten, from Medieval Latin abuttare and Old French abuter, aboter, abouter (“to touch at one end, to come to an end, aim, reach”), from Old French but (“end, aim, purpose”); akin to Old Norse butr (“piece of wood”). Equivalent to a- (“to”) + butt (“boundary mark”).

verb/əˈbʌt/Received-Pronunciation/əˈbʌt/US/əˈbʊt/Northern-England
  1. To lean against on one end; to end on, of a part of a building or wall.

    intransitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English abutten, from Old French aboter (“to touch at one end, border on”), abouter (“to join end to end”), abuter (“to buttress, to put an end to”), from a- (“towards”) + bout (“end”), boter, bouter (“to strike”), buter (“to strike, finish”). Equivalent to a- (“towards, change to”) + butt (“push”)

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.