Noun

(en-noun) (by suppletion)

An individual; usually a human being.

* 1784 , William Jones, The Description and Use of a New Portable Orrery, &c. , PREFACE

THE favourable reception the Orrery has met with from Per?ons of the fir?t di?tinction, and from Gentlemen and Ladies in general, has induced me to add to it ?everal new improvements in order to give it a degree of Perfection; and di?tingui?h it from others; which by Piracy, or Imitation, may be introduced to the Public.

* , chapter=7

, title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=“A very welcome, kind, useful present, that means to the parish. By the way, Hopkins, let this go no further. We don't want the tale running round that a rich person has arrived. Churchill, my dear fellow, we have such greedy sharks, and wolves in lamb's clothing. […]”}}

# A character or part, as in a play; a specific kind or manifestation of individual character, whether in real life, or in literary or dramatic representation; an assumed character.

#* Francis Bacon

his first appearance upon the stage in his new person of a sycophant or juggler

#* Jeremy Taylor

No man can long put on a person and act a part.

#* Milton

To bear rule, which was thy part / And person , hadst thou known thyself aright.

#* South

How different is the same man from himself, as he sustains the person of a magistrate and that of a friend!

# (Christianity) Any one of the three hypostases of the Holy Trinity: the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit.

#* Book of Common Prayer

three persons and one God

# Any sentient or socially intelligent being.

# (in a compound noun or noun phrase) Someone who likes or has an affinity for (a specified thing).

Jack's always been a dog person , but I prefer cats.

The physical body of a being seen as distinct from the mind, character, etc.

*, III.1.2.iii:

when the young ladies laughed at her for it, she replied, that it was not his person that she did embrace and reverence, but, with a Platonic love, the divine beauty of his soul.

* 1897 , (Henry James), (What Maisie Knew) :

The Captain, inclining his military person , sat sideways to be closer and kinder […].

* 1978 , (Lawrence Durrell), Livia , Faber & Faber 1992 (Avignon Quintet), p. 418:

At first blush it seemed that what was striking about him rested on the fact that his dress was exotic, his person foreign.

* 2004 , (The New York Times) :

Meanwhile, the dazed Sullivan, dressed like a bum with no identification on his person , is arrested and put to work on a brutal Southern chain gang.

(legal) Any individual or formal organization with standing before the courts.

At common law a corporation or a trust is legally a person .

(legal) The human genitalia; specifically , the penis.

* 1824 , ( 5 Geo. 4. c. 83, United Kingdom), section 4:

[E]very Person wilfully, openly, lewdly, and obscenely exposing his Person in any Street, Road, or public Highway, or in the View thereof, or in any Place of public Resort, with Intent to insult any Female ... and being subsequently convicted of the Offence for which he or she shall have been so apprehended, shall be deemed a Rogue and Vagabond, within the true Intent and Meaning of this Act ...

* 1972 , Evans v. Ewels'', ''Weekly Law Reports , vol. 1, p. 671 at pp. 674–675:

It seems to me that at any rate today, and indeed by 1824, the word "person " in connection with sexual matters had acquired a meaning of its own; a meaning which made it a synonym for "penis." It may be ... that it was the forerunner of Victorian gentility which prevented people calling a penis a penis. But however that may be I am satisfied in my own mind that it has now acquired an established meaning to the effect already stated. It is I venture to say, well known amongst those who practise in the courts that the word "person" is so used over and over again. It is the familiar synonym of that part of the body, and, as one of the reasons for my decision in this case, I would use that interpretation of what was prevailing in 1824 and what has become established in the 150 years since then.

(grammar) A linguistic category used to distinguish between the speaker of an utterance and those to whom or about whom he is speaking. See grammatical person.

(biology) A shoot or bud of a plant; a polyp or zooid of the compound Hydrozoa, Anthozoa, etc.; also, an individual, in the narrowest sense, among the higher animals.

* Encyc. Brit.

True corms, composed of united personae yet in sponges and corals occasionally by fusion of several originally distinct persons .

(Haeckel)

Noun

(en noun)

That which is considered to exist as a separate entity, object, quality or concept.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-21, author=(Oliver Burkeman)

, volume=189, issue=2, page=48, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= The tao of tech , passage=The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about […], or offering services that let you […], "share the things you love with the world" and so on. But the real way to build a successful online business is to be better than your rivals at undermining people's control of their own attention.}}

A word, symbol, sign, or other referent that can be used to refer to any entity.

An individual object or distinct entity.

(informal) Something that is normal or generally recognised.

(legal) Whatever can be owned.

The latest fad or fashion.

(in the plural) Clothes, possessions or equipment.

(informal) A unit or container, usually containing edible goods.

(informal) A problem, dilemma, or complicating factor.

(slang) A penis.

* 1959 , , (Naked Lunch) , 50th anniversary edition (2009), p. 126:

“Oh Gertie it’s true. It’s all true. They’ve got a horrid gash instead of a thrilling thing .”

A living being or creature.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-03, volume=408, issue=8847, magazine=(The Economist)

, title= Revenge of the nerds , passage=Think of banking today and the image is of grey-suited men in towering skyscrapers. Its future, however, is being shaped in converted warehouses and funky offices in San Francisco, New York and London, where bright young things in jeans and T-shirts huddle around laptops, sipping lattes or munching on free food.}}

That which matters; the crux.

* 1914 , Eugene Gladstone O'Neill, The Movie Man] [playscript:

Don’t forget to have Gomez postpone that shooting thing . (in reference to the execution of Fernandez)

(chiefly, historical) A public assembly or judicial council in a Germanic country.

* 1974 , Jón Jóhannesson, A History of the Old Icelandic Commonwealth: Íslendinga Saga , translated by Haraldur Bessason, page 46:

In accordance with Old Germanic custom men came to the thing fully armed, [...]

* 1974', Jakob Benediktsson, ''Landnám og upphaf allsherjarríkis'', in ''Saga Íslands'', quoted in '''1988 by Jesse L. Byock in ''Medieval Iceland: Society, Sagas, and Power , page 85:

The goðar'' seem both to have received payment of ''thing-fararkaup from those who stayed home and at the same time compensated those who went to the thing , and it cannot be seen whether they had any profit from these transactions.

* 1988 , Jesse L. Byock, Medieval Iceland: Society, Sagas, and Power , page 59:

All Icelandic things were skap-thing , meaning that they were governed by established procedure and met at regular legally designated intevals at predetermined meeting places.