proper
Pluralpropers
- 1Suited or acceptable to a purpose or set of circumstances; fit and suitable.
Make sure you store the chemicals in a proper container.
Without proper training, the new staff struggled with the machines.
Similarsuitable, appropriate, correct, right, fitting
Oppositewrong, incorrect, unsuitable
- 2Used after a noun: in the strict or narrow sense of the word, not including what is only loosely connected, as in the city proper.
The festival crowds spilled well beyond the village proper.
The museum proper opens at nine, though the gardens are free all day.
UsageComes after the noun: the city proper is the city without its suburbs, while the proper city is the right one.
- 3Correct or decorous; following the accepted standards of behavior and manners.
His proper conduct at the ceremony impressed the elders.
There is a proper way to address a judge in court.
UsageOften in it isn't proper to do something, and in the set phrase prim and proper.
Similarpolite, decent, correct, right, conventional
Oppositeimproper, impolite, inappropriate, indecent
- 4Real and satisfactory; being fully what a thing of that kind should be, rather than a poor or partial substitute.
They served a proper feast, with several courses and fine wine.
She finally found a proper job that matched her skills.
Oppositepartial, superficial, slapdash
- 5In grammar, identifying one individual person, place, or thing by its name, as "Paris" or "Amazon" does, and usually capitalized in writing.
Teachers explain that a proper name always takes a capital letter.
In this sentence, 'Amazon' functions as a proper noun, not a common one.
UsageMostly in proper noun and proper name.
Oppositecommon
Note
The grammarian's sense is the one behind proper noun and proper name, set against the common noun that names a whole class. Capitalization is the visible sign, but the grammar runs deeper. Proper nouns usually resist the plural and the indefinite article, so a form like "a Paris" or "the two Londons" signals a special, shifted use.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- The grammatical sense identifies particular entities by name and underlies proper noun and proper name, in contrast with common noun. en.wikipedia.org
- Proper nouns are capitalized in English. writingcenter.gmu.edu
- Proper nouns generally resist plural forms and indefinite articles; pluralized place names represent a special use. en.wikipedia.org
- 6Belonging or relating exclusively to a specific person or thing; particular to it.
Courage and loyalty are virtues proper to the knightly class.
Each region has dances proper to its festivals.
UsageUsually followed by to: virtues proper to a calling.
Similarparticular, specific, individual, singular, peculiar
Note
Here the word keeps close company with peculiar: a saint proper to every peculiar infirmity, or, in James Marsh's 1829 essay prefacing Coleridge's Aids to Reflection, the "peculiar attributes" that make up "our proper humanity."
Less common meanings
- 7Utter or complete; used as an intensifier to stress the full extent of something.
The whole trip turned into a proper disaster.
Our new neighbor turned out to be a proper nuisance.
UsageUsually a proper + noun, often a bad one: a proper mess, a proper disaster.
- 8In a correct, thorough, or fitting way; a casual variant of "properly."
The mechanic finally got the engine running proper after hours of tinkering.
Nobody in my family ever talked proper, according to my aunt.
UsageComes after the verb: fix it proper. In edited writing, use properly.
Oppositebadly, wrong, incorrectly
- 9Thoroughly or completely; used informally to mean 'really' or 'very'.
He was proper chuffed with his exam results.
The car got proper stuck in the mud after all that rain.
UsageBefore an adjective it means really (proper tired); after a verb, thoroughly (stuck proper).
Similarreally, very, thoroughly, completely
Note
A colloquial intensifier, chiefly of the UK and Ireland, that works in two positions. After a verb it means thoroughly, as in Conan Doyle's "buzzing round proper" or Ray Lawler's "towelled him up proper." Before an adjective it means really or very, as in Anthony Burgess's "proper pissed" or a Scots Magazine writer's "proper daft."
- 10In mathematics, being strictly part of some larger thing and not the whole thing itself.
The set of even numbers is a proper subset of the integers.
Since a proper subset must leave something out, {1, 2} is a proper subset of {1, 2, 3}, but {1, 2, 3} is not a proper subset of itself.
Similarstrict
Oppositeimproper
Note
Mathematics uses the word to rule out the trivial case where the part is the whole. Every set is a subset of itself, but a subset unequal to that set is a proper subset. The same qualifier builds proper ideal and proper divisor, and it always points back to the whole being ruled out, whether that whole is named or only understood.
- 11Attractive and elegant; pleasing to look at in form or style.
The same tyme was Moses borne, and was a propper [translating ἀστεῖος (asteîos)] childe in the sight of God, which was norisshed up in his fathers housse thre monethes.
1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt (Tyndale Bible)Similarhandsome, fine, elegant, attractive
Oppositeplain, unattractive
Note
A sense now kept in regional speech, meaning good-looking or elegant. Tyndale's New Testament of 1526 calls the infant Moses "a propper childe," rendering the Greek asteîos.
- 12A thing set apart and reserved for a particular use.
- 13Belonging to oneself or to the thing itself; one's very own.
a man so bold That dares do justice on my proper son
c. 1596, William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth,. Epilogue.” - 14A part of the Christian liturgy whose text changes according to the date or feast being observed.
- 15Depicted in natural or usual coloring rather than the conventional heraldic tinctures.
- 16In set theory, describing a class that is not itself a set.
- 17In topology, describing a continuous map under which the preimage of every compact set is compact (in some definitions, a closed map whose point preimages are compact).
- 18In mathematical analysis, describing a metric space in which every closed ball is compact.
- 19In algebraic geometry, describing a morphism that is separated, of finite type and universally closed, or a variety whose morphism to its base field is of this kind.
- 20In mathematics and physics, designating a function or value that is an eigenfunction or eigenvalue.
- 21In topology, describing a continuous function that maps closed sets to closed sets and for which the preimage of every point is compact.
- 22In algebraic geometry, describing a variety for which the unique morphism to the base field k is proper.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
From Middle English propre, borrowed via Anglo-Norman and Old French propre from Latin proprius.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- English proper derives from Middle English propre. en.wiktionary.org
- The borrowing passed through Anglo-Norman and Old French forms. en.wiktionary.org
- The French form was borrowed from Latin proprius. en.wiktionary.org