lic

English

Alternative forms

• lic.

Noun

lic (plural lics)

1. Abbreviation of license/licence.

Anagrams

• CIL, CLI, LCI

Irish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /l̠ʲɪc/

Noun

lic f

1. (archaic, dialectal) Alternative form of leic: dative singular of leac

Lower Sorbian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /lit͡s/,

Verb

lic

1. second-person singular imperative of licyś

Old English

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *līk, from Proto-Germanic *līką.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /liːt͡ʃ/

Noun

līċ n

1. dead body, corpse

   Ōga cwæþ þæt hē wisse hwǣr þæt līċ bebyrġed wǣre.

   Oga said he knew where the body was buried.

2. (rare outside of poetry) body (living or dead)
   • late 9th century, King Alfred's translation of Saint Augustine's Soliloquies

     Hū, ne sæġde iċ ǣr þæt sē þe bær līċ ġefrēdan wolde, þæt hē hit sċolde mid barum handum ġefrēdan?

     Didn't I say before that if you want to feel someone's bare body, you have to feel it with your bare hands?

3. form

Usage notes

• *līką was the general word for "body" in Proto-Germanic (as still in Gothic), but by the time of written Old English, līċ has come to mean a dead body specifically, and the general word for "body" is līchama.
• The older sense “body (living or dead)” is preserved mainly in poetry and in certain compounds such as līcþēote (“pore,” literally “body pipe”). Some other compounds even preserve the yet older sense “form,” otherwise totally obsolete: eoforlīċ (“bore figure,” e.g. a boar crest on a helmet). See also the derived terms -līċ → Modern English -ly and ġelīċ → like, which both originally meant “formed” or “shaped” at some point in Proto-Germanic.

Declension

Synonyms

• hrǣw

Derived terms

• ġelīċ (“like, similar”)
• -līċ (adjective-forming suffix: “-y, -ly, -like”)
• līchama (“body”)
• līcian (“to please,” impersonal: “to like”)
• līctūn (“cemetery”)
• līcþeġnung (“funeral”)
• līcþēote (“pore”)

Descendants

• Middle English: lich, lik
  • English: lich
  • Scots: lyke, lich

Polish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /lit͡s/
• Rhymes: -it͡s
• Syllabification: lic

Noun

lic

1. genitive plural of lico

Scottish Gaelic

Noun

lic f

1. dative of leac

Slovene

Noun

lic

1. genitive dual/plural of lice

Spanish

Etymology

Clipping of licenciado (“bachelor”).

Noun

lic m or f (plural lics)

1. (informal) bachelor