public

• publick, publicke, publike, publique (all obsolete)

From Anglo-Norman publik, public, Middle French public, publique et al., and their source, Latin pūblicus (“pertaining to the people”). Compare people.

Displaced native Old English ceorlfolc and Old English folclic.

• IPA^(key): /ˈpʌblɪk/

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• Rhymes: -ʌblɪk
• Hyphenation: pub‧lic

public (comparative more public, superlative most public)

1. Able to be seen or known by everyone; open to general view, happening without concealment. [from 14th c.]
   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene vi], page 100, column 1:

     VVith ſcoffs and ſcornes, and contumelious taunts, / In open Market-place produc't they me, / To be a publique ſpectacle to all: / Here, ſayd they, is the Terror of the French, / The Scar-Crovv that affrights our Children ſo.

   • 2011 April 18, Sandra Laville, The Guardian:

     Earlier this month Godwin had to make a public apology to the family of Daniel Morgan after the collapse of a £30m inquiry into his murder in 1987.

   • 2013 June 28, Joris Luyendijk, “Our banks are out of control”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 3, page 21:

     Seeing the British establishment struggle with the financial sector is like watching an alcoholic […]. Until 2008 there was denial over what finance had become. When a series of bank failures made this impossible, there was widespread anger, leading to the public humiliation of symbolic figures.

2. Pertaining to the people as a whole (as opposed to a private group); concerning the whole country, community etc. [from 15th c.]
   • 2010 September 16, Adam Vaughan, The Guardian:

     A mere 3% of the more than 1,000 people interviewed said they actually knew what the conference was about. It seems safe to say public awareness of the Convention on Biological Awareness in Nagoya - and its goal of safeguarding wildlife - is close to non-existent.

   • 2013 May 17, George Monbiot, “Money just makes the rich suffer”, in The Guardian Weekly‎, volume 188, number 23, page 19:

     In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. […]  The public realm is privatised, the regulations restraining the ultra-wealthy and the companies they control are abandoned, and Edwardian levels of inequality are almost fetishised.

3. Officially representing the community; carried out or funded by the state on behalf of the community. [from 15th c.]
   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XXII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

     From another point of view, it was a place without a soul. The well-to-do had hearts of stone; the rich were brutally bumptious; the Press, the Municipality, all the public men, were ridiculously, vaingloriously self-satisfied.

   • 2004 June 18, “The Guardian”, in Leader:

     But culture's total budget is a tiny proportion of all public spending; it is one of the government's most visible success stories.

4. Open to all members of a community; especially, provided by national or local authorities and supported by money from taxes. [from 15th c.]
   • 2011 May 10, David Smith, The Guardian:

     Some are left for dead on rubbish tips, in refuge bags or at public toilets.

   • 2013 June 14, Jonathan Freedland, “Obama's once hip brand is now tainted”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 1, page 18:

     Now we are liberal with our innermost secrets, spraying them into the public ether with a generosity our forebears could not have imagined. Where we once sent love letters in a sealed envelope, or stuck photographs of our children in a family album, now such private material is despatched to servers and clouds operated by people we don't know and will never meet.

5. (of a company) Traded publicly via a stock market.
6. (not comparable, object-oriented programming) Accessible to the program in general, not only to the class or any subclasses.

• private

public (plural publics)

1. The people in general, regardless of membership of any particular group.

   Members of the public may not proceed beyond this point.

   • 1905, Baroness Emmuska Orczy, chapter 2, in The Tremarn Case‎:

     “Two or three months more went by ; the public were eagerly awaiting the arrival of this semi-exotic claimant to an English peerage, and sensations, surpassing those of the Tichbourne case, were looked forward to with palpitating interest. […] ”

   • 2007 May 4, Martin Jacques, The Guardian:

     Bush and Blair stand condemned by their own publics and face imminent political extinction.

2. (public relations) A particular group or demographic to be targeted.
   • 2005, Donald Treadwell, Jill B. Treadwell, Public Relations Writing: Principles in Practice, page 19:

     To the extent that you will use them to reach many other publics, the news media will also be one of your publics.

3. (archaic) A public house; an inn.
   • 1824 June, [Walter Scott], Redgauntlet, […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC:

     these inconsiderate lads will be out of the house, and away to the publics, wasting their precious time , and

• “public”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• public in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
• “public”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “public”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

Borrowed from Latin pūblicus. The noun is from the adjective.

• IPA^(key): /py.blik/

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public (feminine publique, masculine plural publics, feminine plural publiques)

1. public (various meanings)
   1. (relational) of the people as a whole; public [from 1238]

      l’intérêt public ― the public interest

      le bien public ― the public good

      La voix publique est pour lui. ― The public voice is for him.

   2. public; seen or known by everyone [from 1330]

      C’est une nouvelle qui est déjà publique. ― It's already public news.

   3. public; representing the state on behalf of the community [from 1390]

      Synonym: étatique

      pouvoirs publics ― public powers

      notaire public ― public notary

   4. public; open to all [from 1538]

      Synonym: commun

      lieu public ― public place

      fille publique ― streetwalker, prostitute (literally, “public girl”)

public m (plural publics)

1. public (people in general) [from 1320]
   • 2015 October 3, Romain Gueugneau, “Le smartphone tout terrain s’aventure dans le grand public”, in LesEchos‎:

     Et la demande augmente dans le grand public.

     And the demand is increasing amongst the general public.

2. audience [from 1671]

   Il devait plaire à son public. ― He had to please his audience.

   • 2016, Claudine Monfette, Robert Charlebois, Pierre Nadeau (lyrics and music), “Ordinaire”, in Encore un soir‎, performed by Céline Dion:

     Quand je chante, c’est pour le public

     When I sing, it's for the audience

• “public”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

public m pl

1. plural of publich

From Latin publicus.

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public m (feminine singular publica, masculine plural publics, feminine plural publicas)

1. public

   Antonym: privat

• publicament

public m (plural publics)

1. public, audience

• publik
• publiq
• publique

public m (oblique and nominative feminine singular publique)

1. public (not private; available to the general populace)

• en public

• publik on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub

Borrowed from French public, from Latin publicus.

• IPA^(key): /ˈpu.blik/

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public m or n (feminine singular publică, masculine plural publici, feminine and neuter plural publice)

1. public

public n (plural publice)

1. the public