Frater

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈfreɪtə(ɹ)/

Definitions

1. A male sibling or a member of a religious community who shares a brotherly role
2. A man related by birth or belonging to a monastic group as a brother in faith
3. An individual who is either a male family member or part of a spiritual brotherhood

Etymology: The English noun "frater" is a learned borrowing from Latin "frāter", meaning "brother", and it stays close to its Latin shape. Its ancestor reaches back to a reconstructed prehistoric word for "brother" that also gave rise to words as different as "friar" and "pal". Those relatives came into English through separate routes, so "frater" and "friar" are doublets, two forms of one inherited word that entered the language at different times and by different paths. The English word "friar" came in by way of Old French and was used for members of the religious orders, the brothers of a monastery. "Frater" was taken directly from Latin, which is why it kept the vowel and ending of its source. Its sense of a brother in the family, a male sibling, was the original meaning in Latin, so the English term is a deliberate reach back to classical vocabulary rather than an everyday word.

Synonyms: brother, sibling, comrade, mate, fellow

Antonyms: sister, female, antagonist, opponent, enemy