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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

pope.

An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/pəʊp/Received-Pronunciation/poʊp/US/pəʉp/Australia/pɐʉp/New-Zealand
  1. An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state.

  2. An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state. Any similarly absolute and 'infallible' authority.

    broadly · ironic · often
  3. An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state. Any similar head of a religion.

    broadly
  4. An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state. A theocrat, a priest-king, including (at first especially) over the imaginary land of Prester John or (now) in figurative and alliterative uses.

    uncommon
  5. An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state. An effigy of the pope traditionally burnt in Britain on Guy Fawkes' Day and (occasionally) at other times.

    UK
  6. An honorary title of the Roman Catholic bishop of Rome as father and head of his church, a sovereign of the Vatican city state. Pope Day, the present Guy Fawkes Day.

    US · obsolete
  7. An honorary title of the Coptic bishop of Alexandria as father and head of his church.

  8. An honorary title of the Orthodox bishop of Alexandria as father and head of his autocephalous church.

  9. Any bishop of the early Christian church.

    historical · obsolete
  10. The ruffe, a small Eurasian freshwater fish (Gymnocephalus cernua); others of its genus.

    UK
  11. The Atlantic puffin (Fratercula arctica).

    Cornwall · Devon · Scotland · UK · regional
  12. The painted bunting (Passerina ciris).

    US · regional
  13. The red-cowled cardinal (Paroaria dominicana).

    rare
  14. Garlic, when used in addition to the Holy Trinity of celery, bell peppers and onions.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English pope, popa, from Old English pāpa, from Vulgar Latin papa (title for priests and bishops, esp. and by 8th c. only the bishop of Rome), from early Byzantine Greek παπᾶς (papâs, title for priests and bishops, especially by 3rd c. the bishop of Alexandria), from late Ancient Greek πάπας (pápas, title for priests and bishops, in the sense of spiritual father), from πάππας (páppas, “papa, daddy”).

verb/pəʊp/Received-Pronunciation/poʊp/US/pəʉp/Australia/pɐʉp/New-Zealand
  1. To act as or like a pope.

    intransitive
  2. To convert to Roman Catholicism.

    colloquial · intransitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English pope, popa, from Old English pāpa, from Vulgar Latin papa (title for priests and bishops, esp. and by 8th c. only the bishop of Rome), from early Byzantine Greek παπᾶς (papâs, title for priests and bishops, especially by 3rd c. the bishop of Alexandria), from late Ancient Greek πάπας (pápas, title for priests and bishops, in the sense of spiritual father), from πάππας (páppas, “papa, daddy”).

noun/pəʊp/Received-Pronunciation/poʊp/US/pəʉp/Australia/pɐʉp/New-Zealand
  1. Any mulled wine (traditionally including tokay) considered similar and superior to bishop.

Where this word comes from

By analogy with bishop (“mulled and spiced wine”).

noun/pəʊp/Received-Pronunciation/poʊp/US/pəʉp/Australia/pɐʉp/New-Zealand
  1. The whippoorwill (Antrostomus vociferus, syn. Caprimulgus vociferus).

    US · dialectal · obsolete
  2. The nighthawk (Chordeiles minor).

    US · dialectal · rare
Where this word comes from

Of Onomatopoeic origin.

noun/pəʊp/Received-Pronunciation/poʊp/US/pəʉp/Australia/pɐʉp/New-Zealand
  1. Alternative form of pop, a Russian Orthodox priest.

    alt-of · alternative
Where this word comes from

From Russian поп (pop), from Old Church Slavonic попъ (popŭ), from Byzantine Greek παπᾶς (papâs) as above.

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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.