region
Pluralregions
- 1A large, connected area of land or sea of indefinite extent, often viewed as a single place for geographic, social, or cultural reasons.
The coastal region attracts thousands of tourists each summer.
Vineyards thrive in regions with warm days and cool nights.
UsageOften the + plural for broad belts of the earth: the polar regions, the tropical regions.
- 2An official division of a country, territory or city that forms a unit for government and administration.
Residents must apply for building permits through the planning office of the region where they live.
Under the reform, the country was redrawn into twelve regions, each with an elected assembly and its own budget.
Note
An administrative region has boundaries someone has drawn and a set place in a system of government, which separates it from the broad geographical sense, whose extent is loose. Several systems give the word to one particular tier, as in Chile and in Quebec. The use is old: the city of Rome and the land around it were divided into regions too.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 5 facts
- Chile uses regions as a particular administrative tier. en.wikipedia.org
- Quebec has an established tier of administrative regions. quebec.ca
- The EU's NUTS classification uses regions at three statistical levels, rather than assigning the word to one administrative tier. ec.europa.eu
- Ancient Rome was divided into administrative regions. en.wikipedia.org
- The territory surrounding Rome was also divided into regions in antiquity. en.wikipedia.org
- 3A separate zone of anything that is not land or sea, for example of space, a surface, a molecule or a scale of values.
The drug binds to a short region of the protein molecule and blocks its action.
Infrared radiation occupies the region of the spectrum just beyond visible red light.
UsageA region of the spectrum is a part of it, but in the region of fifty means about fifty.
Similarpart, area, segment, portion, zone
Note
Scientific writing uses it when a whole has parts, with or without fixed borders: a region of a protein, the infrared region of the spectrum, a region of a graph or a surface.
- 4A particular part or area of the body, identified for medical or anatomical purposes.
The surgeon made a small incision in the abdominal region.
Swelling appeared in the regions surrounding the injury.
UsageUsually after a word that locates it: the abdominal region, the chest region, the lower back region.
Note
Anatomy uses it as a working term for a mapped part of the body, usually paired with an adjective that does the locating: the abdominal region, or in the plural, the abdominal regions. Such regions are marked out by landmarks on the surface or structures beneath it. That lets a clinician pin a symptom, a sign or an incision to an agreed place rather than a vague area.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Anatomical regions are delineated using surface landmarks or underlying structures. medicine.uams.edu
- Anatomical divisions allow clinicians to localize symptoms and signs. en.wikipedia.org
- Anatomical landmarks allow clinicians to locate incisions precisely. medicine.uams.edu
Less common meanings
- 5An approximate amount or extent, used when giving a rough figure rather than an exact one.
The company's losses were in the region of ten million dollars last year.
Repairs to the bridge are expected to cost in the region of two million dollars.
UsageUsed in the phrase in the region of + a number: in the region of ten million. No need to add about.
Similarneighborhood, vicinity
- 6The parts of a country lying outside its capital city, taken together as a whole; used in the plural with the.
Arts funding has long favored the capital over the regions.
The minister promised that the regions would get a fairer share of transport spending.
UsageOften heard in complaints about fairness: money and attention go to the capital rather than to the regions.
Similarprovinces
Note
A chiefly British way of dividing a country in two: the capital on one side and everywhere else, taken together, as the regions. A single region is simply an area of land and carries none of this contrast.
- 7The people living in a particular area or district of a country, considered together.
The whole region turned out to vote in record numbers.
When the factory closed, the region felt betrayed.
Similarcommunity, population
- 8Someone's place, rank, or station; high standing or dignity.
he is of too high a region
c. 1597, William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”Note
Here rank is pictured as altitude. Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor (c. 1597) has "he is of too high a region," meaning a man of too lofty a standing. The use is obsolete. A modern writer would say station or rank, and region used this way will read as a deliberate echo of Elizabethan English.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 4 facts
- The Merry Wives of Windsor is by William Shakespeare and is conventionally dated to approximately 1597 as a composition date. smtd.umich.edu
- The quotation occurs in the play; Page speaks it about Fenton in Act 3, scene 2. folger.edu
- The passage uses height figuratively for social rank or standing. en.wiktionary.org
- In this quotation, region means rank or standing. en.wiktionary.org
- 9In old cosmology, the space extending from the earth's surface out to the orbit of the moon, called the elemental region.
Note
The full term was the elemental region, and the bare word served as its shorthand. Pre-modern cosmology placed the four classical elements at work in this zone, beneath the unchanging celestial spheres. The use is obsolete and survives only in accounts of that world picture. Even there, the full phrase elemental region is the clearer choice.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Elemental region was the full expression, and region alone could denote the same space below the moon. en.wiktionary.org
- Premodern cosmology placed the four classical elements in the elemental region. celt.ucc.ie
- The celestial realm above this zone was regarded as unchanging. en.wikipedia.org
Practice
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Origin
Latin regiō, itself based on regō, passed through Anglo-Norman regiun into Middle English as regioun. Regio is a doublet of it.