metropolitan

[ me-truh-pol-i-tn ]
See synonyms for: metropolitanmetropolitans on Thesaurus.com

adjective
  1. of, noting, or characteristic of a metropolis or its inhabitants, especially in culture, sophistication, or in accepting and combining a wide variety of people, ideas, etc.

  2. of or relating to a large city, its surrounding suburbs, and other neighboring communities: the New York metropolitan area.

  1. pertaining to or constituting a mother country.

  2. pertaining to an ecclesiastical metropolis.

noun
  1. an inhabitant of a metropolis.

  2. a person who has the sophistication, fashionable taste, or other habits and manners associated with those who live in a metropolis.

  1. Eastern Church. the head of an ecclesiastical province.

  2. an archbishop in the Church of England.

  3. Roman Catholic Church. an archbishop who has authority over one or more suffragan sees.

  4. (in ancient Greece) a citizen of the mother city or parent state of a colony.

Origin of metropolitan

1
1300–50; Middle English <Late Latin mētropolītānus of, belonging to a metropolis <Greek mētropolī́t(ēs) (see metropolis, -ite1) + Latin -ānus-an

Other words from metropolitan

  • met·ro·pol·i·tan·ism, noun
  • in·ter·met·ro·pol·i·tan, adjective
  • non·met·ro·pol·i·tan, adjective, noun
  • su·per·met·ro·pol·i·tan, adjective
  • un·met·ro·pol·i·tan, adjective

Words Nearby metropolitan

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use metropolitan in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for metropolitan

metropolitan

/ (ˌmɛtrəˈpɒlɪtən) /


adjective
  1. of or characteristic of a metropolis

  2. constituting a city and its suburbs: the metropolitan area

  1. of, relating to, or designating an ecclesiastical metropolis

  2. of or belonging to the home territories of a country, as opposed to overseas territories: metropolitan France

noun
    • Eastern Churches the head of an ecclesiastical province, ranking between archbishop and patriarch

    • Church of England an archbishop

    • RC Church an archbishop or bishop having authority in certain matters over the dioceses in his province

Derived forms of metropolitan

  • metropolitanism, noun

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