Northern

How to spell northern

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce northern

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does northern mean?

1. adjectiveSituated in, directed toward, or characteristic of the north.

Northern in a sentence

• The northern counties tend to get heavier snowfall in winter.

• They bought a holiday cottage on the northern coast.

Where does northern come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Northern descends from the Old English northerne, an adjective meaning 'of or coming from the north', built on the noun north combined with the old Germanic adjective ending -erne that also gave us eastern, western and southern. The root north itself goes back to a shared Germanic word (related to Old Norse northr and modern German Nord) whose deeper meaning is uncertain, though some scholars link it to an idea of 'to the left', since a person facing the rising sun in the east would have north on their left hand. The -ern ending is a genuine fossil: it survives only in the four compass adjectives and no longer forms new words, which is why northern can feel slightly irregular to spell. The word has stayed remarkably stable in form for over a thousand years, and the silent, lightly pronounced -er- in the middle is the main spot where writers occasionally stumble.

How the word is built

• north (the cardinal direction)
• -ern (Old English directional suffix forming adjectives, as in eastern, western)