Self Definition

sĕlf
selfs, selves
noun
selves
The total, essential, or particular being of a person; the individual.
American Heritage Medicine
The identity, character, or essential qualities of any person or thing.
Webster's New World
One's own person as distinct from all others.
Webster's New World
One's own welfare, interest, or advantage; selfishness.
Obsessed with self.
Webster's New World
That which the immune system identifies as belonging to the body.
American Heritage Medicine
pronoun
Myself, yourself, himself, or herself.
A living wage for self and family.
American Heritage
Myself, himself, herself, or yourself.
Tickets for self and wife.
Webster's New World

(commercial or humorous) Myself.

I made out a cheque, payable to self, which cheered me up somewhat.
Wiktionary
adjective
Being uniform or the same throughout.
Webster's New World
Of the same material as the article with which it is used.
A dress with a self belt.
American Heritage
Of the same kind, nature, color, material, etc. as the rest.
A self lining, self trim.
Webster's New World
Same or identical.
American Heritage
Sir Walter Raleigh.
On these self hills.
Wiktionary
verb
To fertilize or pollinate itself. Used of hermaphroditic organisms.
American Heritage

(botany) To fertilise by the same individual; to self-fertilise or self-pollinate.

Wiktionary
prefix
Oneself; itself.
Self-control.
American Heritage
Automatic; automatically.
Self-loading.
American Heritage
Wiktionary
affix
Of oneself or itself.
Self-love, self-restraint.
Webster's New World
By oneself or itself.
Self-acting.
Webster's New World
In, within, or inherent in oneself or itself.
Self-absorption, self-evident.
Webster's New World
To, for, or with oneself.
Self-addressed.
Webster's New World
Automatic.
Self-loading.
Webster's New World
suffix
Used in forming intensive and reflexive forms of the singular personal pronouns.
Wiktionary

Other Word Forms of Self

Noun

Singular:
self
Plural:
selves, selfs

Origin of Self

  • From Middle English self, silf, sulf, from Old English self, seolf, sylf (“same, self, very, own"), from Proto-Germanic *selbaz (“self"), from Proto-Indo-European *selbÊ°- (“one's own"), from Proto-Indo-European *s(w)e- (“separate, apart"). Cognate with Scots self (“self"), West Frisian self (“self"), Dutch zelf (“self"), Low German sulv (“self"), German selbst (“self"), Danish selv (“self"), Icelandic sjálfur (“self"). Possibly related to Albanian thelb (“core, center, heart").

    From Wiktionary

  • Middle English selfsame from Old English s(w)e- in Indo-European roots

    From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition

  • Middle English from Old English from self self self

    From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition

  • From self; compare Dutch -zelf.

    From Wiktionary

  • ME < OE < self: see self

    From Webster's New World College Dictionary, 5th Edition

  • From the noun self.

    From Wiktionary

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