different between cousin vs cousins

English

Etymology

From Middle English cosyn, from Old French cosin, from Latin c?ns?br?nus, from com- + s?br?nus.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?k?z.n?/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?k?z.?n/, /?k?z?n/
• (US, weak vowel merger) IPA^(key): [?k??z.??n]
• Rhymes: -?z?n
• Homophone: cozen (weak vowel merger)

Noun

cousin (plural cousins)

1. The child of a person's uncle or aunt; a first cousin.

   Synonym: first cousin

2. Any relation who is not a direct ancestor or descendant but part of one's extended family; one more distantly related than an uncle, aunt, granduncle, grandaunt, nephew, niece, grandnephew, grandniece, etc.
3. (obsolete) A title formerly given by a king to a nobleman, particularly to those of the council. In English writs, etc., issued by the crown, it signifies any earl.
4. (figuratively) Something kindred or related to something else.
   • 2003 Nov. 21, Tim Homfray, "What do they mean...," Times Educational Supplement (UK) (retrieved 20 Nov 2012):

     Partnering, along with its less irritating cousin "partnership", crops up all over the place, being equally useful to the lazy jargoneer and the lazy policy-maker. It has been said that there is no noun which cannot be verbed; in the same way, there is now nothing, concrete or abstract, which cannot be partnered.
5. (espionage, slang, chiefly in the plural) A member of the British intelligence services (from an American perspective) or of the American intelligence services (from a British perspective).

Usage notes

• People who have common grandparents but different parents are first cousins. People who have common great-grandparents but no common grandparents and different parents are second cousins, and so on.
• In general, one's nth cousin is anyone other than oneself, one's siblings or nearer cousins found by going back n+1 generations and then forward n+1 generations. One of one's first cousin's parents is one's parents' siblings. One of one's second cousin's grandparents is one of one's grandparents' siblings.
• The child of one's first cousin is one's first cousin once removed; the grandchild of one's first cousin is one's first cousin twice removed, and so on. For example, if Phil and Marie are first cousins, and Marie has a son Andre, then Phil and Andre are first cousins once removed.
• In the southern US, the relation is considered the number of links between two people of common ancestry to the common aunt or uncle.
• A patrilineal or paternal cousin is a father's niece or nephew, and a matrilineal or maternal cousin a mother's. Paternal and maternal parallel cousins are father's brother's child and mother's sister's child, respectively; paternal and maternal cross cousins are father's sister's child and mother's brother's child, respectively.

Hyponyms

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• once removed
• twice removed

Further reading

• cousin on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• scioun

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ku.z??/

Etymology 1

From Middle French cousin, from Old French cosin, from Latin c?ns?br?nus.

Noun

cousin m (plural cousins, feminine cousine)

1. cousin (male)

Etymology 2

From Latin culic?nus (“mosquito-like”), from culex (“gnat, midge”).

Noun

cousin m (plural cousins)

1. crane fly

Synonyms

• maringouin

Derived terms

• cousinière (“protective mesh against crane flies”)

Further reading

• “cousin” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Middle French

Etymology

From Old French cosin.

Noun

cousin m (plural cousins, feminine singular cousine, feminine plural cousines)

1. male cousin

Descendants

• French: cousin

Norman

Alternative forms

• couôsîn (Standard Jèrriais)
• couôthîn (Saint Ouen)

Etymology

From Old French cosin, from Latin c?ns?br?nus.

Noun

cousin m (plural cousins, feminine cousaine)

1. (Guernsey) (male) cousin

English

Noun

cousins

1. plural of cousin

Related terms

• kissing cousins

Anagrams

• sciouns

French

Noun

cousins m

1. plural of cousin

Anagrams

• cosinus, coussin, cuisons, cuisson, sucions