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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

border.

The line or frontier area separating political or geographical regions.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈbɔə.də/Australia/ˈbɔː.də/Received-Pronunciation/ˈbɔɹ.dɚ/General-American[ˈbo̞ɹ.dɚ]General-American
  1. The line or frontier area separating political or geographical regions.

    countable · uncountable
    The border between Canada and USA is the longest in the world.
  2. The outer edge of something.

    countable · uncountable
    the borders of the garden
  3. A decorative strip around the edge of something.

    countable · uncountable
    There’s a nice frilly border around the picture frame.
    a solid border around a table of figures
  4. A strip of ground in which ornamental plants are grown.

    countable · uncountable
  5. Border morris or border dancing.

    UK · uncountable
  6. A string that is both a prefix and a suffix of another particular string.

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Old French bordeurebor. Middle English bordure English border Inherited from Middle English bordure, from Old French bordeure, of Germanic origin, from Frankish *bord, equivalent to modern French bord (“a border”) + -er. Akin to Middle High German borte (“border, trim”), German Borte (“ribbon, trimming”). Doublet of bordure. More at board. Not cognate to beard, although inside Germanic there may have been influence between the senses of these two roots: see e.g. Old Norse barð (“edge”).

verb/ˈbɔə.də/Australia/ˈbɔː.də/Received-Pronunciation/ˈbɔɹ.dɚ/General-American[ˈbo̞ɹ.dɚ]General-American
  1. To put a border on something.

    transitive
  2. To form a border around; to bound.

    transitive
  3. To lie on, or adjacent to, a border of.

    transitive
    Denmark borders Germany to the south.
  4. To touch at a border (with on, upon, or with).

    intransitive
    Connecticut borders on Massachusetts.
  5. To approach; to come near to; to verge (with on or upon).

    intransitive
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Old French bordeurebor. Middle English bordure English border Inherited from Middle English bordure, from Old French bordeure, of Germanic origin, from Frankish *bord, equivalent to modern French bord (“a border”) + -er. Akin to Middle High German borte (“border, trim”), German Borte (“ribbon, trimming”). Doublet of bordure. More at board. Not cognate to beard, although inside Germanic there may have been influence between the senses of these two roots: see e.g. Old Norse barð (“edge”).

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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.