"wild man" meaning in All languages combined

See wild man on Wiktionary

Noun [English]

Forms: wild men [plural], wildman [alternative], wild-man [alternative]
Etymology: From Middle English wilde man. Cognate with Dutch wildeman (“wildman, savage”). By surface analysis, wild + man. Etymology templates: {{inh|en|enm|wilde man}} Middle English wilde man, {{cog|nl|wildeman|t=wildman, savage}} Dutch wildeman (“wildman, savage”), {{surf|+com|en|wild|man}} By surface analysis, wild + man Head templates: {{en-noun|wild men}} wild man (plural wild men)
  1. (European folklore) A mythic or legendary primitive man inhabiting forests or wilderness regions, typically depicted as hairy all over and unclothed. Tags: European Coordinate_terms: wild woman
    Sense id: en-wild_man-en-noun-ZpYgPgAC Categories (other): European folklore, English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Mythological creatures Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 31 31 12 27 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 30 30 14 26 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 28 28 19 25 Disambiguation of Mythological creatures: 25 25 28 21 Topics: arts, folklore, history, human-sciences, literature, media, publishing, sciences
  2. (European folklore) A mythic or legendary primitive man inhabiting forests or wilderness regions, typically depicted as hairy all over and unclothed.
    (In heraldry and art) A representation of such a figure, usually shown as a club-bearing, hairy man of the woods.
    Tags: European Coordinate_terms: wild woman
    Sense id: en-wild_man-en-noun-SeKAIsfz Categories (other): European folklore, English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Mythological creatures Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 31 31 12 27 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 30 30 14 26 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 28 28 19 25 Disambiguation of Mythological creatures: 25 25 28 21 Topics: arts, folklore, history, human-sciences, literature, media, publishing, sciences
  3. A rowdy, dissolute, rash, or violent man. Synonyms (violent, dissolute, rash, or rowdy person): miscreant, rascal, roughneck, ruffian
    Sense id: en-wild_man-en-noun-mXOLZgDc Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Mythological creatures Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 31 31 12 27 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 30 30 14 26 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 28 28 19 25 Disambiguation of Mythological creatures: 25 25 28 21 Disambiguation of 'violent, dissolute, rash, or rowdy person': 2 2 90 6
  4. A man who advocates unorthodox or outrageous opinions or who behaves in an eccentric manner. Synonyms (person exhibiting unorthodox views or eccentric behavior): kook
    Sense id: en-wild_man-en-noun-Ox67IeAe Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Mythological creatures, People Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 31 31 12 27 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 30 30 14 26 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 28 28 19 25 Disambiguation of Mythological creatures: 25 25 28 21 Disambiguation of People: 0 0 0 100 Disambiguation of 'person exhibiting unorthodox views or eccentric behavior': 14 14 12 60
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Synonyms: oddball, weirdo Synonyms (hairy primitive man): woodwose
Disambiguation of 'hairy primitive man': 40 40 10 10

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

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      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A man who advocates unorthodox or outrageous opinions or who behaves in an eccentric manner."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "advocate",
          "advocate"
        ],
        [
          "unorthodox",
          "unorthodox"
        ],
        [
          "outrageous",
          "outrageous"
        ],
        [
          "eccentric",
          "eccentric"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "sense": "hairy primitive man",
      "word": "woodwose"
    },
    {
      "sense": "violent, dissolute, rash, or rowdy person",
      "word": "miscreant"
    },
    {
      "sense": "violent, dissolute, rash, or rowdy person",
      "word": "rascal"
    },
    {
      "sense": "violent, dissolute, rash, or rowdy person",
      "word": "roughneck"
    },
    {
      "sense": "violent, dissolute, rash, or rowdy person",
      "word": "ruffian"
    },
    {
      "sense": "person exhibiting unorthodox views or eccentric behavior",
      "word": "kook"
    },
    {
      "word": "oddball"
    },
    {
      "word": "weirdo"
    }
  ],
  "word": "wild man"
}

Download raw JSONL data for wild man meaning in All languages combined (6.4kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-09-28 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-09-02 using wiktextract (1a05e46 and e3d6d4e). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.