hombre

English

A sombrero-wearing mariachi singer in Chicago, Illinois, U.S.

WOTD – 16 September 2017

Etymology

Borrowed from Spanish hombre (“man; human being”). Doublet of gome, homo, ombre, and omi.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɒmbɹeɪ/, /-bɹi/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɑmbɹeɪ/, /ˈʌmbɹeɪ/, /-bɹi/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

• Rhymes: (Received Pronunciation) -ɒmbɹeɪ
• Hyphenation: hom‧bre

Noun

hombre (plural hombres)

1. (chiefly US, in Spanish-speaking contexts, slang) A man, a chap, a guy; especially a Hispanic or Spanish man.
   • c. 1850, [Thomas] Mayne Reid, “A Group of Jarochos”, in The Guerilla^[sic] Chief, and Other Tales, London: C. H. Clarke, 13, Paternoster Row, →OCLC, page 62:

     [W]e're glad to learn that the Yankee bullet has not quite stopped your breath. You're all right, hombre!

   • 1852 March 8, E. P., “Golden Correspondence.—No. 1”, in J[oseph] M. Church, editor, Church’s Bizarre. For Fireside and Wayside, volume I, number 1 (New Series), Philadelphia, Pa.: Church & Co., 140 Chestnut Street, published 17 April 1852, →OCLC, page 9, column 2:

     That hombre now with the worn out hat, tattered shirt, and fragmentary breeches, wears a sword. Bless you, his dignity would suffer greatly without it!

   • 1995, Paul Vautin, Turn It Up!, Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia, page 92:

     Coming towards us was the biggest, meanest looking hombre I'd ever seen.

   • 2010, Jon Sharpe [pseudonym], chapter 1, in Rocky Mountain Revenge (The Trailsman; no. 342), New York, N.Y.: Signet Books, New American Library, →ISBN:

     The foreman. As tough an hombre who ever lived. If Mr. Bell had sent Jackson instead of me, he'd take your rifle and beat you half to death with it.

   • 2016, Lawrence Winkler, “Bajada”, in Orion’s Cartwheel (Cartwheels Quadrilogy; 1), Victoria, B.C.: First Choice Books, →ISBN, page 22:

     There was a pause I didn't like, punctuated by shrieks of shrill laughter from the hombres at the bar. Only Mexicans can laugh like that.

   • 2025 October 20, Carlos Lozada, “You Caught Me. I’m Speaking Spanish.”, in The New York Times‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC:

     Spanish has become a sanctioned indicator of potential criminality in the United States of America. The language of Miguel de Cervantes and Andrés Cantor, the world’s fourth most spoken tongue, has been deemed the sound of bad hombres in our midst.

     (Can we archive this URL?)

Further reading

• hombre on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Aragonese

Alternative forms

• home

Etymology

From Old Navarro-Aragonese hombre~home, from Latin hominem.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈombɾe/
• Syllabification: hom‧bre
• Rhymes: -ombɾe

Noun

hombre m (plural hombres)

1. man
2. a 17th-century Spanish card game (c. 1650-1660), usually played by three persons with a pack of 40 cards.

   the lone player in this game undertaking to win the pool against two defenders.

References

• “hombre”, in Aragonario, diccionario castellano–aragonés (in Spanish)

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɔ̃bʁ/

• Audio (France (Lyon)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Somain)):

  (file)

• Homophones: hombres, ombre, ombres, ombrent

Noun

hombre m (plural hombres)

1. a kind of card game from Spain

Descendants

• → English: ombre

Further reading

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

Old Navarro-Aragonese

Alternative forms

• ombre, ome, omme, homme
• uamne (11th century, Glosas Emilianenses)

Etymology

Inherited from Latin hominem.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈombɾe/

Noun

hombre m (plural hombres)

1. man
   • 14th c., Crónica de San Juan de la Peña:

     SEGVNT QVE HAVE / mos leydo en muytos liuros el primʳo hombŕ q̀ se poblo / en España hauia nombre Tubal, del qual yxio la ge- / na͡con d'los ybers.

     As we have read in many books, the first man to settle in Spain was named Tubal, from whom issued the race of the Iberians.

Descendants

• Aragonese: ombre

Further reading

• Nagore Laín, Francho (2021), Vocabulario de la crónica de San Juan de la Peña (versión aragonesa, s. XIV), Zaragoza: Prensas de la Universidad de Zaragoza, page 268

Spanish

Alternative forms

• honbre, ombre, onbre (obsolete)

Etymology

Inherited from Old Spanish omne, from Latin hominem, homō, from Old Latin hemō, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰmṓ (“earthling”). The Old Spanish form omne was first dissimilated to omre and then a gliding sound -b- arose before the -r-. Compare the same development in hembra, nombre, hambre and costumbre.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈombɾe/ [ˈõm.bɾe]

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ombɾe
• Syllabification: hom‧bre

Noun

hombre m (plural hombres)

1. man, (adult male human)

   Synonyms: caballero, señor

   Antonym: mujer

   Sé (un) hombre! ― Man up!

   • 2020 September 10, Alexis Benveniste, “El listado Fortune 500 ahora tiene un número récord de mujeres CEO: apenas 39”, in CNN en Español‎^[2]:

     Fraser se une a otras 38 mujeres en la lista de CEOs de Fortune 500, conformada en su mayoría por blancos y hombres.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

2. man, (all humans collectively); mankind, humankind

   Synonym: ser humano

3. (anthropology, archaeology, paleontology) man, (individual of the species Homo sapiens, the genus Homo, or the subtribe Hominina)

   Synonyms: humano, persona

4. (colloquial) husband

   Synonym: marido

5. (gay slang) top

   Synonym: activo

6. ombre (Spanish card game)

Derived terms

• abominable hombre de las nieves
• buen hombre
• como un solo hombre
• cuerpo de hombre
• de hombre a hombre
• Hijo del Hombre
• hombre al agua
• hombre bueno
• hombre cis
• hombre con hombre
• hombre de armas
• hombre de barba
• hombre de Cromañón
• hombre de Dios
• hombre de guerra
• hombre de jengibre
• hombre de la bolsa
• hombre de la calle
• hombre de letras
• hombre de Neandertal
• hombre de negocios
• hombre de paja
• hombre de pelo en pecho
• hombre de punto
• hombre del mundo
• hombre del tiempo
• hombre gamba
• hombre lobo
• hombre muerto
• hombre orquesta
• hombre prevenido vale por dos
• hombre rana
• hombre trans
• hombredad
• hombría
• juego del hombre
• manos besa el hombre, que querría ver cortadas
• matahombres
• pobre hombre
• por cuerpo de hombre

Related terms

• prohombre

Descendants

• Chavacano: hombre
• → English: hombre
• → French: hombre
  • → English: ombre
• → Papiamentu: hòmber

Interjection

¡hombre!

1. man!
2. hey!
3. oh, come on!

Further reading

• “hombre”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025