body

BAH-dee/ˈbɑ.di/BO-dee/ˈbɒd.i/

21 meanings of body

1
physical formnouncountable
The complete physical structure of a person or animal, including a person's physical side as distinct from the mind or soul.
The human body contains hundreds of muscles working together.
Cold weather forces the body to burn more energy to stay warm.
Similarframe
Note
The sense the rest grow from goes back to Old English bodiġ, which could mean the trunk, the chest, even a person's height or stature. The King James Bible of 1611 already uses it for a whole made of parts: the foot and the hand both belong to the body.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
Body descends from Old English bodiġ, whose meanings included trunk, chest, height and stature. en.wiktionary.org
The King James Bible was first published in 1611, as its first-edition title page records. en.wikisource.org
The King James Bible describes the body as a whole with multiple members, including the foot and hand. en.wikisource.org
2
organizationnouncountable or uncountable
A group of people who act together for a shared purpose, often as an official organization.
An independent body oversees elections to ensure they are fair.
Several regulatory bodies investigated the bank's lending practices.
UsageCommon in governing body, regulatory body and an independent body.
Similarorganization, agency, authority, group, association
3
corpsenouncountable
The lifeless physical form of a person who has died; a corpse.
Investigators recovered the body from the wreckage.
The funeral home prepared the body for burial.
Similarcorpse, remains, cadaver
4
nouncountable or uncountable
The largest or most important part of something, as distinct from its added or accessory parts; in vehicles, the outer shell around the frame and engine.
The car's body had rusted, though the engine and frame were sound.
The body of the cathedral survived the fire, but the spires collapsed.
Similarshell, bodywork
Note
It is a trade word as much as a driver's. In early tramway and motor-truck writing, bodies were a product in their own right, built by firms such as the Motor Truck Body Company and supplied apart from the rest of the vehicle. That is why a car can have ruined bumpers and a sound body. The same trade also uses the verb for building them.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
Early tramway writing describes vehicle bodies made by specialist firms; Wiktionary reproduces an example from The Tramway and Railway World. en.wiktionary.org
The Motor Truck Body Company existed and manufactured commercial vehicle bodies. tile.loc.gov
Vehicle bodies were offered separately for fitting to chassis. tile.loc.gov
Body is also a verb meaning to construct a car's bodywork. en.wiktionary.org
5
torsonouncountable or uncountable
The central part of a human or animal frame, excluding the limbs, head, and tail.
The boxer landed several punches to his opponent's body rather than the head.
The armor plate shielded the body, leaving the joints and head exposed.
Similartorso, trunk
Note
Both this narrower meaning and the whole organism go back to Old English bodiġ, which could name the trunk and chest. Boxing keeps it in everyday use. There, a blow to the body is aimed at the torso rather than the head, and the whole phrase depends on that contrast.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 1 fact
Old English bodiġ could mean the trunk or chest. bosworthtoller.com
6
objectnouncountable
A distinct physical object or mass, including a solid figure in geometry.
Gravity pulls every body toward the center of the earth.
Astronomers tracked several bodies moving through the outer solar system.
Similarobject, mass
7
set of factsnouncountable or uncountable
A unified collection of facts, knowledge, information, or creative works, such as an artist's whole output.
A growing body of research links sleep quality to memory.
The artist's body of work spans four decades.
UsageUsually in a body of evidence, research, knowledge or work.
Similarcollection, corpus, mass
8
expansenouncountable or uncountable
A mass or collected amount of some substance, especially something that is otherwise uncountable, such as water.
The reservoir is the largest body of water in the region.
Cold bodies of water hold more dissolved oxygen.
UsageMost often a body of water, which covers lakes, seas and channels alike.
Similarexpanse, mass, stretch
Note
This countable sense turns a mass into a single thing: water, air, sand and ice each become a body of something. Thomas Paine writes in 1806 of the whole body of air moving in a breeze, and geologists describe a body of sand.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
Thomas Paine wrote about the whole body of air moving in a breeze. thomaspaine.org
The Paine passage was published in 1806. thomaspaine.org
Geologists have described a body of sand. en.wiktionary.org

Less common meanings

9
main textnouncountable or uncountable
The main content of a letter, message, document, or piece of code, as distinct from its headings, signature, or declarations.
The body of the report runs to forty pages, not counting the appendices.
He pasted the address into the header and typed his message in the body.
Similartext, content
10
thickness (liquids)noununcountable
A full, solid, or rich quality, as of wine, hair, fabric, or sound.
This red wine has a rich body that coats the glass and fills the mouth.
The cheap paint lacked body and dripped in thin runs down the wall.
UsageUsually have body or lack body; for wine, full-bodied is the common adjective.
Similarrichness, fullness, substance
Note
The taster's sense is a matter of degree: a wine has more or less of it, and a poor one lacks body. The idea travels beyond the glass. Paint can lack body, and in 1989 Caroline Foty, writing in Gay Community News, found a soprano without enough "dark body" for a torchy melody.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
Caroline Foty wrote the cited review in Gay Community News in 1989. en.wiktionary.org
Foty described a soprano as having insufficient "dark body" for a torchy melody. en.wiktionary.org
11
personnoundatedcountable or uncountable
A person, in older or informal use.
She's a kind old body who always brings something to share.
Cobb Belcher's downstairs. He wants to buy you a beer. Says a body who can whip his brother Dell must be a body worth knowing.
1995, Cyberflix, Dust: A Tale of the Wired West
Similarsoul, person
Note
An old, homely way of saying "a person", and a generic one: a body is anyone at all, much as one is. Mark Twain writes "A body's got to do things when he's awful hungry" in 1876, and Joseph C. Lincoln keeps the same he in 1913. Its everyday life is in somebody, nobody and anybody.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
The quoted wording occurs in Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, spoken by Huckleberry Finn. gutenberg.org
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was published in 1876. en.wikisource.org
Joseph C. Lincoln likewise used generic "a body" followed by "he" in Mr. Pratt's Patients. home.hiwaay.net
12
make fullerverbtransitive
To give body or shape to something, making it fuller or more substantial.
Varnish makers once used open fires to body their oils, cooking them slowly until they turned thick and syrupy.
Long, slow heating bodies linseed oil, turning it into a thick, honey-like medium that helps paint flow smoothly and hide brush marks.
Similarfill
Note
The verb is usually heard with forth, and Shakespeare is the reason. In A Midsummer Night's Dream, imagination "bodies forth / The forms of things unknown." The phrase means giving a vague idea a shape the mind can see, and it stays literary. William Irwin Thompson writes of a myth "bodying forth a principle" in 1981. The forms are regular: bodies, bodying, bodied.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 6 facts
Shakespeare's use influenced later literary uses of body forth. archive.org
The quotation occurs in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream; Theseus speaks it in Act V, Scene I. gutenberg.org
Body forth means to give something mental shape. archive.org
William Irwin Thompson describes a myth as bodying forth a principle. en.wiktionary.org
The Thompson quotation comes from The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light, first published in 1981. openlibrary.org
The regular verb forms are bodies, bodying, and bodied. en.wiktionary.org
13
make realverbtransitive
To give concrete form to something abstract; to embody.
The sculptor bodied forth the idea of freedom as a woman breaking her chains.
A good novelist can body forth a vague mood so vividly that readers feel they have lived it.
Similarembody, express, incarnate, represent
Note
It is far rarer than embody and usually comes with forth, as in bodying forth an idea. Philip Larkin uses it in "Toads" (1954), where one of two things gives outward form to the other, a person's inner truth, and there it means to stand for something or make it concrete. Body in this sense is a poet's compression.
14
thrashverbslangtransitive
To defeat someone utterly and humiliatingly.
She bodied the reigning champion in straight sets.
Players who body their rivals online love to brag about it.
UsageOften passive: get bodied, got bodied in the final.
Similardestroy, crush, thrash, trounce, demolish
Note
A bloodless extension of the "kill" slang, now at home in sports and gaming talk.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
The sense ‘defeat utterly’ extends the slang sense ‘kill’. en.wiktionary.org
15
nounUKcountablebritish
A snug one-piece top, cut like a leotard, that closes with fasteners between the legs; a bodysuit.
A lace body looks smart under a blazer with high-waisted trousers.
The shop's new range includes ribbed bodies in black, white and four brighter shades.
UsageAmerican English usually says bodysuit.
Similarbodysuit
16
build car shellverbtransitive
To construct the bodywork of a car, fitting its outer shell to the frame.
Skilled craftsmen can body a sedan almost entirely by hand.
The firm bodied luxury cars on imported chassis.
17
oppressed personnouncountable or uncountable
A human being considered as a member of a marginalized or oppressed group.
The conference focused on how queer and trans bodies have been policed, erased, and pushed out of public spaces.
In her essay, she asks why the Black body is still treated as a threat in American public life.
UsageUsually plural with a group adjective (Black bodies, trans bodies); outside academic and activist writing it can sound like jargon.
Note
In sociology and critical writing, the physical person is the point: what is done to people is done to their bodies. The word usually comes in the plural with a group adjective, as in black bodies, brown bodies and transgender bodies. Laura Harrison's Brown Bodies, White Babies (2016) is an example.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
Laura Harrison wrote Brown Bodies, White Babies, published in 2016. nyupress.org
18
murderverbslangtransitive
To murder a person.
He swore he'd body the man who betrayed him.
They bodied two dealers over unpaid debts.
Similarkill, murder, waste, ice, smoke
Note
Violent slang from African-American Vernacular English: to body someone is to kill them. It is never neutral. Because the milder "defeat" meaning grew out of it, context has to make clear which one is meant.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
The defeat sense developed as an extension of the murder sense. en.wiktionary.org
19
main hall (church)nouncountable or uncountable
The main central part of a church, running from the entrance toward the chancel; the nave.
Worshippers filled the body of the cathedral.
Stone columns lined the body of the church on both sides.
UsageAlmost always in the body of the church or cathedral.
Similarnave
Note
Nave is the technical term and body the plainer one. It names the part where worshippers gather, as opposed to the chancel beyond it.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
The body of a church is its nave. nationalchurchestrust.org
The nave accommodates worshippers and is distinct from the chancel beyond it. newbremenhistory.org
Worshippers gather in the nave. newbremenhistory.org
20
dress topnounarchaiccountable or uncountable
The part of a dress extending from the neckline to the waist, not including the sleeves.
Note
A dressmaker's term from an older wardrobe, now archaic, for the fitted part of a dress that covers the torso. It sits naturally in period settings, as when Penny presses the body of her new dress.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
Body has an archaic clothing sense denoting the torso section of a dress. en.wiktionary.org
The Penny example illustrates this dress sense; it is an unattributed usage example, with no claimed literary author or speaker. en.wiktionary.org
21
printing typenouncountable or uncountable
The metal shank of a piece of type, or the depth of that shank, by which the size of the type is measured.
The compositor measured the body of each piece of type.
A larger body produces more space between the printed lines.
Similarshank
Note
Printers used this term for metal type. Each character is cast on a shank, and the body is that block, or its depth, which fixes the size. The printed letter and its block are named separately, so a printer can speak of a nonpareil face on an agate body. Mary Kay Duggan describes music notes that were probably cast on bodies of the standard 14 mm size.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 6 facts
Printers called the metal shank of a type its body. gutenberg.org
A metal type has a character cast on a block or shank. en.wikipedia.org
Body denotes the shank itself. gutenberg.org
Body size is determined by the depth of the type. gutenberg.org
Face and body sizes can be named separately, including a nonpareil face on an agate body. en.wiktionary.org
Duggan says the stemless notes were probably cast on standard 14 mm bodies; she presents this as a reconstruction. en.wiktionary.org

Practice

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Origin

From Middle English body, from Old English bodiġ ("body, trunk, chest, torso, stature"), from Proto-West Germanic *bodag ("body, trunk"), perhaps ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰewdʰ- ("to be awake, observe"). It is cognate with Old High German botah ("body, corpse, trunk").

Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 5 facts

English body derives from Middle English body and Old English bodiġ. en.wiktionary.org
Old English bodiġ meant body, trunk, chest, torso, and stature. en.wiktionary.org
Old English bodiġ derives from Proto-West Germanic *bodag, meaning body or trunk. en.wiktionary.org
An ultimate connection with Proto-Indo-European *bʰewdʰ-, meaning to be awake or observe, is proposed tentatively. en.wiktionary.org
Body is cognate with Old High German botah, meaning body, corpse, or trunk. en.wiktionary.org