barbarian

[bahr-bair-ee-uh n] /bɑrˈbɛər i ən/
noun
1.
a person in a savage, primitive state; uncivilized person.
2.
a person without culture, refinement, or education; philistine.
3.
(loosely) a foreigner.
4.
  1. a non-Greek.
  2. a person living outside, especially north of, the Roman Empire.
  3. a person not living in a Christian country or within a Christian civilization.
5.
(among Italians during the Renaissance) a person of non-Italian origin.
adjective
6.
uncivilized; crude; savage.
7.
foreign; alien.
Origin
1540-50; < Latin barbari(a) barbarous country (see barbarous, -ia) + -an
Related forms
barbarianism, noun
half-barbarian, adjective
nonbarbarian, adjective, noun
Synonyms
3. alien. 6. rude, primitive, wild, rough, barbaric, coarse, ignorant, uncultivated. Barbarian, barbaric, barbarous pertain to uncivilized people. Barbarian is the general word for anything uncivilized: a barbarian tribe. Barbaric has both unfavorable and mildly favorable connotations, implying crudeness of taste or practice, or conveying an idea of rude magnificence and splendor: barbaric noise. Barbarous emphasizes the inhumanity and cruelty of barbarian life: barbarous customs.
Antonyms
6. cultivated, civilized.
Examples from the web for barbarian
  • The sun served the semi-ape who ranged, and the savage, and even the barbarian.
  • The only difference is that the meat on the spit is likely to be an unfriendly barbarian neighbor.
  • Becoming a barbarian is always a danger to modern humanity.
  • Yet that has not stopped today's bankers savouring the prospect of an even bigger barbarian raid.
  • Causing fuel and electricity prices to go up in a cooling climate is barbarian.
  • In his hardheaded view, barbarian invasions cleaned up stagnant and oppressive regimes.
  • Psychiatry will anyway become a barbarian mistake of the past, but this should rather happen today then tomorrow.
  • barbarian raids began from the north and grew in scope and intensity.
  • When change is called for, a raging barbarian is apposite.
  • It is easy to stoop to the level of the barbarian in revenge.
British Dictionary definitions for barbarian

barbarian

/bɑːˈbɛərɪən/
noun
1.
a member of a primitive or uncivilized people
2.
a coarse, insensitive, or uncultured person
3.
a vicious person
adjective
4.
of an uncivilized culture
5.
insensitive, uncultured, or brutal
Derived Forms
barbarianism, noun
Word Origin
C16: see barbarous
Word Origin and History for barbarian
adj.

mid-14c., from Medieval Latin barbarinus (source of Old French barbarin "Berber, pagan, Saracen, barbarian"), from Latin barbaria "foreign country," from Greek barbaros "foreign, strange, ignorant," from PIE root *barbar- echoic of unintelligible speech of foreigners (cf. Sanskrit barbara- "stammering," also "non-Aryan," Latin balbus "stammering," Czech blblati "to stammer").

Greek barbaroi (n.) meant "all that are not Greek," but especially the Medes and Persians. Originally not entirely pejorative, its sense darkened after the Persian wars. The Romans (technically themselves barbaroi) took up the word and applied it to tribes or nations which had no Greek or Roman accomplishments. The noun is from late 14c., "person speaking a language different from one's own," also (c.1400) "native of the Barbary coast;" meaning "rude, wild person" is from 1610s.

barbarian in the Bible

a Greek word used in the New Testament (Rom. 1:14) to denote one of another nation. In Col. 3:11, the word more definitely designates those nations of the Roman empire that did not speak Greek. In 1 Cor. 14:11, it simply refers to one speaking a different language. The inhabitants of Malta are so called (Acts 28:1,2, 4). They were originally a Carthaginian colony. This word nowhere in Scripture bears the meaning it does in modern times.