overwordExplorer
ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

den.

A small cavern or hollow place in the side of a hill, or among rocks; especially, a cave used by a wild animal for shelter or concealment.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈdɛn/Canada, General-American, Received-Pronunciation/ˈdɪ̟n/

  1. A small cavern or hollow place in the side of a hill, or among rocks; especially, a cave used by a wild animal for shelter or concealment.

    a den of robbers
    Daniel was put into the lions’ den.

  2. A squalid or wretched place; a haunt.

    a den of vice
    an opium den; a gambling den

  3. A comfortable room not used for formal entertaining.

  4. Synonym of fort (“structure improvised from furniture, etc. for playing games.”).

    Our little girls love using bedsheets and other stuff around the house to make dens in the living room and pretending they're on adventures.

  5. A narrow glen; a ravine; a dell.

    Scotland · UK · obsolete

  6. A group of Cub Scouts of the same age who work on projects together.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English den, from Old English denn (“den, lair (of a beast), cave; a swine-pasture, a woodland pasture for swine”), from Proto-West Germanic *dani (“threshing-floor, barn-floor”). Cognate with Scots den (“den, lair”), Middle Dutch denne (“burrow, den, cave, attic”), Dutch den (“ship's deck, threshing-floor, mountain floor”), Middle Low German denne, danne (“threshing-floor, small dale”), German Tenne (“threshing-floor, barn for threshing”).

verb/ˈdɛn/Canada, General-American, Received-Pronunciation/ˈdɪ̟n/

  1. To ensconce or hide oneself in (or as in) a den.

    reflexive

  2. Of an animal, to use as a den; to take up residence in.

    intransitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English den, from Old English denn (“den, lair (of a beast), cave; a swine-pasture, a woodland pasture for swine”), from Proto-West Germanic *dani (“threshing-floor, barn-floor”). Cognate with Scots den (“den, lair”), Middle Dutch denne (“burrow, den, cave, attic”), Dutch den (“ship's deck, threshing-floor, mountain floor”), Middle Low German denne, danne (“threshing-floor, small dale”), German Tenne (“threshing-floor, barn for threshing”).

noun

  1. Abbreviation of denier (a unit of weight).

    abbreviation · alt-of
Where this word comes from

From Old French denier, from Latin denarius.

noun

  1. Alternative form of dene.

    Northumbria · alt-of · alternative
adv

  1. Pronunciation spelling of then, representing AAVE, Bermuda English.

    alt-of · not-comparable · pronunciation-spelling
FROM WORD TO NAME

Try it on your idea.

den has 3 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.

den studioden workshello, den

These are naming prompts. Meanings and pronunciation can vary; existing brand and domain uses have not been checked.

Explore the name generator

A word with a source.

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.