husband
Americannoun
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husbands
plural
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a married man, especially when considered in relation to his partner in marriage.
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British. a manager.
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Archaic. a prudent or frugal manager.
verb (used with object)
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husbands,
present (3rd person singular)
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husbanded,
past participle, past
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husbanding
present participle
noun
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a woman's partner in marriage
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archaic
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a manager of an estate
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a frugal person
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verb
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to manage or use (resources, finances, etc) thriftily
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archaic
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(tr) to find a husband for
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(of a woman) to marry (a man)
-
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obsolete (tr) to till (the soil)
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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husbandsimple
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husbandssimple
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have husbandedperfect
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has husbandedperfect
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am husbandingprogressive
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are husbandingprogressive
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is husbandingprogressive
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have been husbandingperfect progressive
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has been husbandingperfect progressive
Past
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husbandedsimple
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had husbandedperfect
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was husbandingprogressive
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were husbandingprogressive
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had been husbandingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of husband
before 1000; Middle English husband ( e ), Old English hūsbonda master of the house < Old Norse hūsbōndi, equivalent to hūs house + bōndi ( bō-, variant of bū- dwell ( see boor) + -nd present participle suffix + -i inflectional ending)
Explanation
A husband is a married man. Your grandfather might joke that he and your grandmother have been husband and wife for so long because she has the patience of a saint and he is deaf as a post. The word husband comes from the Old Norse hūsbōndi, where hūs meant house and bōndi meant dweller. As a verb, husband means to conserve resources and use them frugally. Because of the flooding in the area, roads are cut off and everyone is being asked to husband their supplies. This conservation of resources sense of husband also occurs in the related noun husbandry.
Vocabulary lists containing husband
The Taming of the Shrew
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Units 2–3
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"The Taming of the Shrew" by William Shakespeare, Induction
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“She’s All That” star Tamara Mello and her husband, Emmy Award-winning TV editor Paolo Cascardo, are parting ways with their thoughtfully restored Los Angeles home—as they prepare to relocate across the country to Florida.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 13, 2026
Her husband kept his last name, while she hyphenated her last name with his.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026
Kozlowski's wife, Sandra Kozlowska, 38, also from Kirkby, was convicted of assisting an offender after she helped her husband to avoid suspicion by depositing money in bank accounts for him and lying to the police.
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2026
Stella Galvis recalls the moments of panic and the dust and how she ran with her child and husband seconds before her four-story building collapsed.
From Barron's ● Aug. 11, 2026
Mrs. Tilbury pushes her husband out of the room.
From "The Bletchley Riddle" by Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin
Belafonte began psychotherapy, initially with Janet Kennedy, an analyst whose two successive husbands, Stanley Levison and Jay Richard Kennedy would each become significant figures in Belafonte’s life.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 7, 2026
Both women were openly wistful about having to leave that behind for one spent supporting their husbands in Washington, D.C.
From Salon ● Jul. 29, 2026
But over the years, 41 women directly followed their deceased husbands into the lower chamber.
From Slate ● Jul. 24, 2026
According to the US House of Representatives in 2025, 45 widowed women have directly succeeded their late husbands in Congress - 38 in the House and eight in the Senate.
From BBC ● Jul. 13, 2026
Naima knew she was a widow because only women who had lost their husbands wore white sarees.
From "Rickshaw Girl" by Mitali Perkins
As it is, I like to think of Dr. Lecter in his Maple Leafs warm-up jersey, losing his carefully husbanded gourmet meal to the little boy.
From New York Times ● Oct. 21, 2021
But he seemed diffident about them when we spoke and finally admitted that since the pandemic began all of his carefully husbanded nervousness has been consumed by life rather than work.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 6, 2020
From there to the line, she husbanded her lead like someone who had been doing it all her life.
From The Guardian ● Sep. 7, 2018
After his parents divorced, Folkert’s mom did yard work and landscaping and cleaned houses to earn money — which she husbanded with care.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 27, 2018
Even the wilderness is carefully husbanded there, and though that forest had been logged for centuries there were no waste places in it, no desolations of stumps, no eroded slopes.
From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin
The glimpse reminded voters that Davis, who was husbanding his resources for a late advertising push, was still in the race.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 25, 2026
He lacks a strategy for husbanding his domestic political capital, without which he will be remembered mainly as an interruption.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 23, 2026
Allies allow you to project power while husbanding your own resources.
From Salon ● Mar. 5, 2025
"The greater risk environment for financials leads to husbanding of capital and risk-taking, less and more conservative investing and lending, and inevitably, lower growth," said Blankfein, who also served as Goldman's chairman, told Reuters.
From Reuters ● Mar. 20, 2023
Aragorn let them drift with the stream as they wished, husbanding their strength against weariness to come.
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
