Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Familiar interchange of ideas or sentiments: communion; intercourse; friendly conversation.
  • To converse; talk together familiarly; impart ideas and sentiments mutually; intérchange thoughts or feelings.
  • To partake of the eucharist or Lord's supper; receive the communion: a common use of the word in America and in Wales.
  • To cause to partake of the eucharist.
  • noun A Middle English form of common.
  • noun In general, a community organized for the protection and promotion of local interests, and subordinate to the state; the government or governing body of such a community.
  • noun Specifically The smallest administrative division of France, governed in its local affairs by a mayor and municipal council; a municipality or township.
  • noun The people or body of citizens of a commune.
  • noun In Russia, the community of peasants in a village. See mir.
  • noun A committee or body of communalists who in 1871 ruled over Paris for a brief period after the retirement of the German troops, but were suppressed, after severe fighting and much damage to the city, by troops under the authority of the National Assembly of France. See communalism.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Communion; sympathetic intercourse or conversation between friends.
  • intransitive verb To converse together with sympathy and confidence; to interchange sentiments or feelings; to take counsel.
  • intransitive verb To receive the communion; to partake of the eucharist or Lord's supper.
  • intransitive verb to think; to reflect; to meditate.
  • noun obsolete The commonalty; the common people.
  • noun A small territorial district in France under the government of a mayor and municipal council; also, the inhabitants, or the government, of such a district. See Arrondissement.
  • noun Absolute municipal self-government.
  • noun a group of people living together as an organized community and owning in common most or all of their property and possessions, and sharing work, income, and many other aspects of daily life. Such sommunities are oftten organized based on religious or idealistic principles, and they sometimes have unconventional lifestyles, practises, or moral codes.
  • noun The revolutionary government, modeled on the commune of 1792, which the communists, so called, attempted to establish in 1871.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A small community, often rural, whose members share in the ownership of property, and in the division of labour; the members of such a community.
  • noun A local political division in many European countries.
  • noun obsolete The commonalty; the common people.
  • verb intransitive, followed by with To be together with; to contemplate or absorb.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb communicate intimately with; be in a state of heightened, intimate receptivity
  • noun the smallest administrative district of several European countries
  • verb receive Communion, in the Catholic church
  • noun a body of people or families living together and sharing everything

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old French comuner ("to share").

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From French commune.

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