# lede

> English word · Noun · IPA /liːd/ · frequency rank #76,937

## Definitions
1. A man; a person.

## Etymology
From Middle English lede, leode (“man; human being, person; lord, prince; God; sir; group, kind; race; a people, nation; human race; land, real property”) [and other forms], from three closely related words:
* Old English lēod (“man; chief, leader; (poetic) prince; a people, people group; nation”);
* Old English lēoda (“man; person; native of a country”), related to lēod; and
* Old English lēode (“men; people; the people of a country”), originally the plural of lēod.
Lēod is inherited from Proto-West Germanic *liudi, from Proto-Germanic *liudiz (“man; person; men; people”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁léwdʰis (“man, people”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁lewdʰ- (“to grow; people”). Doublet of leud.
Cognates
The English word is cognate with Dutch lieden (“people”), lui(den) (“people”), German Leute (“people”), Norwegian lyd (“people”), Polish lud (“people”), Russian люди (ljudi, “people”), West Frisian lie (“people”).

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/lede