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• ward
  ward

  noun

  a division or district of a city or town, as for administrative or political purposes.
• Ward
  Ward

  noun

  (Aaron) Montgomery, 1843–1913, U.S. merchant and mail-order retailer.
• -ward
  -ward

  a native English suffix denoting spatial or temporal direction, as specified by the initial element.

ward

¹ American  

[wawrd] / wɔrd /

noun

• wards
  plural

1. a division or district of a city or town, as for administrative or political purposes.

   Synonyms:

   precinct

2. one of the districts into which certain English and Scottish boroughs are divided.

3. a division, floor, or room of a hospital for a particular class or group of patients.

   a convalescent ward; a critical ward.

4. any of the separate divisions of a prison.

5. a political subdivision of a parish in Louisiana.

6. Mormon Church. one of the subdivisions of a stake, presided over by a bishop.

7. Fortification. an open space within or between the walls of a castle or fortified place.

   the castle's lower ward.

8. Law.

   1. a person, especially a minor, who has been legally placed under the care of a guardian or a court.

   2. the state of being under the care or control of a legal guardian.

   3. guardianship over a minor or some other person legally incapable of managing their own affairs.

9. the state of being under restraining guard or in custody.

10. a person who is under the protection or control of another.

    Synonyms:

    protégé

11. a movement or posture of defense, as in fencing.

12. a curved ridge of metal inside a lock, forming an obstacle to the passage of a key that does not have a corresponding notch.

13. the notch or slot in the bit of a key into which such a ridge fits.

14. the act of keeping guard or protective watch.

    watch and ward.

15. Archaic. a company of guards or a garrison.

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verb (used with object)

• wards,
  present (3rd person singular)
• warded,
  past participle,  past
• warding
  present participle

1. to avert, repel, or turn aside (danger, harm, an attack, an assailant, etc.) (usually followed byoff ).

   to ward off a blow; to ward off evil.

   Synonyms:

   prevent, parry

2. to place in a ward, as of a hospital or prison.

3. Archaic. to protect; guard.

Ward ² American  

[wawrd] / wɔrd /

noun

1. (Aaron) Montgomery, 1843–1913, U.S. merchant and mail-order retailer.

2. Artemas 1727–1800, American general in the American Revolution.

3. Artemus Charles Farrar Browne, 1834–67, U.S. humorist.

4. Barbara Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth, 1914–81, English economist and author.

5. Mrs. Humphry Mary Augusta Arnold, 1851–1920, English novelist, born in Tasmania.

6. Sir Joseph George, 1856–1930, New Zealand statesman, born in Australia: prime minister of New Zealand 1906–12, 1928–30.

7. Lester Frank, 1841–1913, U.S. sociologist.

8. Nathaniel Theodore de la Guard, 1578?–1652, English clergyman, lawyer, and author in America.

9. a male given name.

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-ward ³ American  

1. a native English suffix denoting spatial or temporal direction, as specified by the initial element.

   toward; seaward; afterward; backward.

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ward ¹ British  

/ wɔːd /

noun

1. (in many countries) a district into which a city, town, parish, or other area is divided for administration, election of representatives, etc

2. a room in a hospital, esp one for patients requiring similar kinds of care

   a maternity ward

3. one of the divisions of a prison

4. an open space enclosed within the walls of a castle

5. law

   1. Also called: ward of court. a person, esp a minor or one legally incapable of managing his own affairs, placed under the control or protection of a guardian or of a court

   2. guardianship, as of a minor or legally incompetent person

6. the state of being under guard or in custody

7. a person who is under the protection or in the custody of another

8. a means of protection

9. 1. an internal ridge or bar in a lock that prevents an incorrectly cut key from turning

   2. a corresponding groove cut in a key

10. a less common word for warden 1

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verb

1. archaic (tr) to guard or protect

Ward ² British  

/ wɔːd /

noun

1. Dame Barbara ( Mary ), Baroness Jackson. 1914–81, British economist, environmentalist, and writer. Her books include Spaceship Earth (1966)

2. Mrs Humphry, married name of Mary Augusta Arnold. 1851–1920, English novelist. Her novels include Robert Elsmere (1888) and The Case of Richard Meynell (1911)

3. Sir Joseph George. 1856–1930, New Zealand statesman; prime minister of New Zealand (1906–12; 1928–30)

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-ward ³ British  

suffix

1. (forming adjectives) indicating direction towards

   a backward step

   heavenward progress

2. (forming adverbs) a variant and the usual US and Canadian form of -wards

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Spelling

Both -ward and -wards occur in such words as backward, forward, upward, and toward. The -ward form is by far the more common in edited American English writing.

Usage

What does -ward mean? The suffix -ward is used to mean "in the direction of," either in time or space. It is often used in everyday and technical terms. The form -ward comes from Old English -weard, meaning “towards.”What are variants of -ward?The suffix -ward is more common in North American English. In British English, the variant -wards, as in towards, is more commonly used. Want to know more? Read our Words That Use article on -wards.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• wardless
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• wards
  plural

Participles

• warding
  present
• warded
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• ward
  simple
• wards
  simple
• have warded
  perfect
• has warded
  perfect
• am warding
  progressive
• are warding
  progressive
• is warding
  progressive
• have been warding
  perfect progressive
• has been warding
  perfect progressive

Past

• warded
  simple
• had warded
  perfect
• was warding
  progressive
• were warding
  progressive
• had been warding
  perfect progressive

Future

• will ward
  simple
• will have warded
  perfect
• will be warding
  progressive
• will have been warding
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of ward¹

First recorded before 900; Middle English noun warde, Old English weard; Middle English verb warde(n), Old English weardian; cognate with Middle Dutch waerden, German warten; cf. guard

Origin of -ward³

Middle English; Old English -weard towards; cognate with German -wärts; akin to Latin vertere to turn ( see verse)

Explanation

A ward is a group of rooms or a section in a hospital or prison; in a hospital, different wards deal with different needs, like the psychiatric ward or maternity ward. Although ward is most often used in connection with hospitals and prisons, cities and towns can also be broken into wards. These are usually geographic areas that are used in elections: city council members often represent wards of the city. A ward is also the name given to a child who is watched over by someone other than his parents. Sometimes children are known as "wards of the state," meaning they have been taken from their homes.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

ward Ward -ward wards warded warding

During the many air-raid alerts, Iryna Stebnivska stays in the ward where her four-month-old baby is being treated, rather than going to the shelter.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 4, 2026

Drew spent two weeks on the children's ward at Wrexham Maelor hospital.

From BBC ● Sep. 29, 2026

Weinstein is currently being held at a prison ward at Bellevue Hospital.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 23, 2026

"The entire ward was filled with smoke, we could not see anything," he told the BBC.

From BBC ● Sep. 16, 2026

An increase in plankton in the water drawn from the boreholes around the ship—a sure sign of approaching spring—didn’t ward off the suspense that all the men now felt.

From "Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World" by Jennifer Armstrong

While the area may not have been his favorite, the Brolins certainly made the home their own, tapping celebrated interior design studio, Pierce and Ward, to decorate it with a traditional, baronial aesthetic.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 7, 2026

Lisa Ward, a writer in Vermont, is a contributor to The Wall Street Journal.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 1, 2026

It helps that new sporting director Julian Ward is well known for his global network.

From BBC ● Sep. 29, 2026

“Kim’s major concern isn’t North Korean workers getting killed,” said Peter Ward, a research fellow at the Sejong Institute, a think tank in Seoul.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026

Mr. Ward opened the door of Portable 19.

From "Tangerine" by Edward Bloor

Names in -ward are rather numerous, and, as they mostly come from the titles of rural officials and are often confused with compounds of -herd, they are all put together here.

From The Romance of Names by Ernest Weekley

Some of the occupative names in -ward and -herd are rather deceptive.

From The Romance of Words (4th ed.) by Ernest Weekley

As a suffix -wood is sometimes a corruption of -ward, e.g.

From The Romance of Names by Ernest Weekley

The disdain in her eyes wards off anyone from seeing weakness.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 7, 2026

Its maternity and surgical wards have closed down after a humanitarian organisation left in June.

From BBC ● Sep. 8, 2026

Just a few metres away, life was returning to the hospital, with patients admitted to wards while doctors and nurses bustled around the facility's maze-like corridors.

From Barron's ● Aug. 27, 2026

For two decades, the only shield against respiratory syncytial virus, which fills pediatric wards each winter, was a drug called Synagis.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026

Each ward has about five hundred people, and roughly ten wards make up a stake, which has a president.

From "A Deadly Wandering: A Mystery, a Landmark Investigation, and the Astonishing Science of Attention in the Digital Age" by Matt Richtel

These latest figures have warded off recession concerns, at least for now.

From BBC ● Aug. 31, 2026

Some actual Buffetts have warded off comparisons to Berkshire’s chairman.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 19, 2026

The drug, called lolamicin, also warded off secondary infections with Clostridioides difficile, a common and dangerous hospital-associated bacterial infection, and was effective against more than 130 multidrug-resistant bacterial strains in cell culture.

From Science Daily ● May 29, 2024

The U.S. has mostly warded off the Houthi attacks, but on one occasion recently, the Houthis shot down a U.S.

From Washington Times ● Dec. 24, 2023

She knew she was safe because pine trees were scattered here and there, and they warded off negative energy.

From "A Place to Belong" by Cynthia Kadohata

Praised for warding off pests, so-called bodega cats are also a cultural fixture for New Yorkers, some of whom are now pushing to enshrine legal rights for the little store helpers.

From Barron's ● Feb. 10, 2026

Nostalgia, though, is a peril that the author, an art historian at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, is bent on warding off.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 14, 2025

Social media–savvy psychologists and life coaches have created a cottage industry of warding off and healing from narcissists.

From Slate ● Jul. 23, 2025

Through that work, Leal said he and other scientists have never found a product more long-lasting and overall effective at warding off mosquitoes than DEET.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 6, 2024

“You can keep it if you like, I’ve got a few of them. They’re really excellent for warding off Gulping Plimpies.”

From "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" by J.K. Rowling

Related Words

• department
• parish
• precinct