self

(Internet slang) Abbreviation of selvfølgelig (“of course”).


self

This argument was put forward by the defendant self.

Now that I put on my glasses I could see that the hut was empty but for our two selves; that it must have been absolutely empty till we entered.

1898 July 18, The Leader, Melbourne, page 34, column 1:

But what unites many of these rural railways is that they are shadows of their former selves.

2024 August 21, Richard Foster, “Cultivating the growth in leisure travel”, in RAIL, number 1016, page 37:

(obsolete) Himself, herself, itself, themselves; that specific (person mentioned).

I made out a cheque, payable to self, which cheered me up somewhat.

Southern US, African-American Vernacular, dated

From Middle English self, silf, sulf, from Old English self, seolf, sylf, from Proto-Germanic *selbaz. Cognates include Gothic 𐍃𐌹𐌻𐌱𐌰 (silba), German selbst and Dutch zelf.


self

one's true self; one's better self; one's former self

One individual's personality, character, demeanor, or disposition.

Portia:
To these injunctions every one doth swear
That comes to hazard for my worthless self.

c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ix]:

Thanks to that penny he had just spent so recklessly [on a newspaper] he would pass a happy hour, taken, for once, out of his anxious, despondent, miserable self. It irritated him shrewdly to know that these moments of respite from carking care would not be shared with his poor wife, with careworn, troubled Ellen.

1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter I, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., […], [1933], →OCLC, page 0056:

The subject of one's own experience of phenomena: perception, emotions, thoughts.

The self, the I, is recognized in every act of intelligence as the subject to which that act belongs. It is I that perceive, I that imagine, I that remember, I that attend, I that compare, I that feel, I that will, I that am conscious.

1859–1860, William Hamilton, “Lecture IX”, in H[enry] L[ongueville] Mansel and John Veitch, editors, Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC:

The preposterous altruism too![…]Resist not evil. It is an insane immolation of self—as bad intrinsically as fakirs stabbing themselves or anchorites warping their spines in caves scarcely large enough for a fair-sized dog.

1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVI, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

An individual person as the object of the person's own reflective consciousness (plural selves).

(botany) A seedling produced by self-pollination (plural selfs).

(botany) A flower having its colour uniform as opposed to variegated.

Similarity profiles between helper T cell epitopes (of self or microbial antigens and allergens) and human or microbial SWISSPROT collections were produced. For each antigen, both collections yielded largely overlapping profiles, demonstrating that self-nonself discrimination does not rely on qualitative features that distinguish human from microbial peptides. [...] Epitopes (on self and nonself antigens) can cross-stimulate T cells at increasing potency as their similarity with nonself augments.

2000, G Ristori et al., “Compositional bias and mimicry toward the nonself proteome in immunodominant T cell epitopes of self and nonself antigens”, in FASEB Journal: the official journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, volume 14, number 3, →PMID, pages 431–438:

In plants, the ability to recognize self from nonself plays an important role in fertilization, because self-fertilization will result in less diverse offspring than fertilization with pollen from another individual.

2013 May-June, Katrina G. Claw, “Rapid Evolution in Eggs and Sperm”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:

(molecular biology, immunology) Any molecule, cell, or tissue of an organism's own (belonging to the self), as opposed to a foreign (nonself) molecule, cell, or tissue (for example, infective, allogenic, or xenogenic).

→ Korean: 셀프 (selpeu)

Sranan Tongo: srefi

نَفْس

individual person as the object of own reflective consciousness

себе́ (sebé) (dative case, prepositional case)


self

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

(botany) To fertilize by the same strain; to inbreed.

en-verb

self (third-person singular simple present selfs, present participle selfing, simple past and past participle selfed)

selfs (present singular third-person)
selfing (participle present)
selfed (participle past)
selfed (past)


self

a self bow: one made from a single piece of wood

a self flower or plant: one which is wholly of one colour

Having its own or a single nature or character throughout, as in colour, composition, etc., without addition or change; of the same kind; unmixed.

I owe you much, and, like a wilful youth / That which I owe is lost; but if you please / To shoot another arrow that self way / Which you did shoot the first, I do not doubt, / As I will watch the aim, or to find both, / Or bring your latter hazard back again, / And thankfully rest debtor for the first.

c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:

I am made of that self mettle as my sister.

c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:

But were it granted, yet the heighth of these Mountains is far under the supposed place of Paradise; and on these self Hills the Air is so thin […]

1614, Walter Ralegh [i.e., Walter Raleigh], The Historie of the World […], London: […] William Stansby for Walter Burre, […], →OCLC, (please specify |book=1 to 5):

At that self moment enters Palamon / The gate of Venus […]

1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite: Or, The Knight’s Tale. In Three Books.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

Similarity profiles between helper T cell epitopes (of self or microbial antigens and allergens) and human or microbial SWISSPROT collections were produced. For each antigen, both collections yielded largely overlapping profiles, demonstrating that self-nonself discrimination does not rely on qualitative features that distinguish human from microbial peptides. However, epitopes whose probability of mimicry with self or nonself prevails are, respectively, tolerated or immunodominant and coexist within the same (auto-)antigen regardless of its self/nonself nature. Epitopes (on self and nonself antigens) can cross-stimulate T cells at increasing potency as their similarity with nonself augments.

(molecular biology, immunology) Of or relating to any molecule, cell, or tissue of an organism's own (belonging to the self), as opposed to a foreign (nonself) molecule, cell, or tissue (for example, infective, allogenic, or xenogenic).


self

(the) (very/self) same, (the) aforementioned

Intensifies the pronoun or noun it follows or precedes; very

English: self

Scots: self, sel

Inherited from Old English self, from Proto-West Germanic *selb, from Proto-Germanic *selbaz.


self

themself, themselves; a reflexive pronoun

English: self (obsolete in most pronominal senses)

Scots: self, sel

Yola: zil, zill


self

(the) same thing, (the) aforementioned thing


self

late 9th century, translation of Bede's Ecclesiastical History
Sē wer meahte unēaðe þurh hine selfne ārīsan oþþe gān.

The man could barely get up or walk by himself.

late 9th century, King Alfred's translation of St. Augustine's Soliloquies
Nāt iċ nā þȳ hwā Rōme burg timbrede þe iċ hit self ġesāwe, ac for þȳ þe hit man mē sæġde.

I don't know who built the city of Rome because I saw it myself, but because somebody told me.

self (masculine nominative singular)
self (feminine nominative singular)
self (neuter nominative singular)
selfne (accusative masculine singular)
selfe (accusative feminine singular)
self (accusative neuter singular)
selfes (genitive masculine singular)
selfre (feminine genitive singular)
selfes (genitive neuter singular)
selfum (dative masculine singular)
selfre (dative feminine singular)
selfum (dative neuter singular)
selfe (instrumental masculine singular)
selfre (feminine instrumental singular)
selfe (instrumental neuter singular)
selfe (masculine nominative plural)
selfa (feminine nominative plural)
selfe (feminine nominative plural)
self (neuter nominative plural)
selfe (accusative masculine plural)
selfa (accusative feminine plural)
selfe (accusative feminine plural)
self (accusative neuter plural)
selfra (genitive masculine plural)
selfra (feminine genitive plural)
selfra (genitive neuter plural)
selfum (dative masculine plural)
selfum (dative feminine plural)
selfum (dative neuter plural)
selfum (instrumental masculine plural)
selfum (feminine instrumental plural)
selfum (instrumental neuter plural)
selfa (masculine nominative singular)
selfe (feminine nominative singular)
selfe (neuter nominative singular)
selfan (accusative masculine singular)
selfan (accusative feminine singular)
selfe (accusative neuter singular)
selfan (genitive masculine singular)
selfan (feminine genitive singular)
selfan (genitive neuter singular)
selfan (dative masculine singular)
selfan (dative feminine singular)
selfan (dative neuter singular)
selfan (instrumental masculine singular)
selfan (feminine instrumental singular)
selfan (instrumental neuter singular)
selfan (masculine nominative plural)
selfan (feminine nominative plural)
selfan (neuter nominative plural)
selfan (accusative masculine plural)
selfan (accusative feminine plural)
selfan (accusative neuter plural)
selfra (genitive masculine plural)
selfena (genitive masculine plural)
selfra (feminine genitive plural)
selfena (feminine genitive plural)
selfra (genitive neuter plural)
selfena (genitive neuter plural)
selfum (dative masculine plural)
selfum (dative feminine plural)
selfum (dative neuter plural)
selfum (instrumental masculine plural)
selfum (feminine instrumental plural)
selfum (instrumental neuter plural)

Middle English: self, silf, sulf

English: self

Scots: self


self

self (masculine nominative singular)
selfo (masculine nominative singular)
selfa (masculine nominative singular)
selfa (neuter nominative singular)
self (feminine nominative singular)
selfon (nominative plural)
selfon (accusative masculine singular)
selfan (accusative masculine singular)
self (accusative neuter singular)
selfa (accusative neuter singular)
selfun (accusative feminine singular)
selfon (accusative plural)
selfun (accusative plural)
selfes (genitive masculine singular)
selfas (genitive masculine singular)
selfas (genitive neuter singular)
selfes (genitive neuter singular)
selfaru (feminine genitive singular)
selfaro (feminine genitive singular)
selfaro (genitive plural)
selfomo (dative masculine singular)
selfumu (dative masculine singular)
selfem (dative masculine singular)
selfon (dative neuter singular)
selfun (dative feminine singular)
selfon (dative feminine singular)
selfon (dative plural)

Low German: sulv