Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Proper

Prop′er (prŏp′ẽr), a. [OE. propre, F. propre, fr. L. proprius. Cf. Appropriate.]

1. Belonging to one; one's own; individual. "His proper good" [i. e., his own possessions]. Chaucer. "My proper son." Shak.

Now learn the difference, at your proper cost, Betwixt true valor and an empty boast. Dryden.

2. Belonging to the natural or essential constitution; peculiar; not common; particular; as, every animal has his proper instincts and appetites.

Those high and peculiar attributes . . . which constitute our proper humanity. Coleridge.

3. Befitting one's nature, qualities, etc.; suitable in all respect; appropriate; right; fit; decent; as, water is the proper element for fish; a proper dress.

The proper study of mankind is man. Pope.

In Athens all was pleasure, mirth, and play, All proper to the spring, and sprightly May. Dryden.

4. Becoming in appearance; well formed; handsome. [Archaic] "Thou art a proper man." Chaucer.

Moses . . . was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child. Heb. xi. 23.

5. Pertaining to one of a species, but not common to the whole; not appellative; — opposed to common; as, a proper name; Dublin is the proper name of a city.

6. Rightly so called; strictly considered; as, Greece proper; the garden proper.

7. (Her.) Represented in its natural color; — said of any object used as a charge.

In proper, individually; privately. [Obs.] Jer. Taylor. — Proper flower or corolla (Bot.), one of the single florets, or corollets, in an aggregate or compound flower. — Proper fraction (Arith.) a fraction in which the numerator is less than the denominator. — Proper nectary (Bot.), a nectary separate from the petals and other parts of the flower. — Proper noun (Gram.), a name belonging to an individual, by which it is distinguished from others of the same class; — opposed to common noun; as, John, Boston, America. — Proper perianth or involucre (Bot.), that which incloses only a single flower. — Proper receptacle (Bot.), a receptacle which supports only a single flower or fructification.

Prop′er, adv. Properly; hence, to a great degree; very; as, proper good. [Colloq & Vulgar]

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.