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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

nan.

Synonym of maid: a servant girl.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/næn/General-American, Received-Pronunciation/nan/British, Northern-England, Scotland, Southern, Standard, Wales/nɛn/New-Zealand
  1. Synonym of maid: a servant girl.

    obsolete
  2. Synonym of nancy: an effeminate male homosexual.

    obsolete · slang
  3. Synonym of nursemaid.

    UK · endearing
  4. Synonym of grandmother.

    Australia · Canada · Ireland · New-Zealand · UK · endearing
    We had my nan over for Christmas dinner.
Where this word comes from

From Nan, pet form of the formerly very common female given names Anne and Agnes. As a nursemaid and grandmother, a clipping of earlier nana, from nanny under the probable influence of mama, also from Nan. Compare Mary.

noun/næn/Received-Pronunciation/nɑːn/Received-Pronunciation/næn/General-American/nɑn/General-American
  1. Alternative spelling of naan.

    alt-of · alternative
Where this word comes from

See at naan.

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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.