eldest

Other forms of eldest

plural

eldests·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about eldest

What does eldest mean?

eldest means "the offspring who came first in the order of birth". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in eldest?

eldest has 2 syllables: el-dest. The stress falls on "el". In IPA it is /ˈɛldəst/.

What is another word for eldest?

Close synonyms include firstborn, firstborn. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is eldest a common word?

eldest is banded "Familiar" — widely understood, used when the subject calls for it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.