• • IPA: /ˈæn/
  • IPA: [ˈɛən]
  • IPA: /ən/

From Middle English an, from Old English an.

1. Form of a#Article (all article senses).
   1. Used before a vowel sound.

      I'll be there in half an hour.

      'E's staying at an 'otel. (compare He's staying at a hotel.)

      • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter II, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC ↗:

        Sunning himself on the board steps, I saw for the first time Mr. Farquhar Fenelon Cooke. He was dressed out in broad gaiters and bright tweeds, like an English tourist, and his face might have belonged to Dagon, idol of the Philistines.

   2. (now quite rare) Used before one and words with initial ⟨u⟩, ⟨eu⟩ when pronounced /ju/.
      • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC ↗, Numbers 24:8 ↗:

        God brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows.

   3. (nonstandard) Used before /h/ in a stressed or unstressed syllable.
      • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC ↗, Psalms 40:1–2 ↗:

        1 I waited patiently for the Lord, and he inclined vnto me, and heard my crie.
        2 He brought me vp also out of an horrible pit, out of the mirie clay, and set my feete vpon a rock, and established my goings.

   4. (nonstandard, British, West Country) Used before all consonants.

see an/translations

1. (nonstandard, British, West Country) one

1. (archaic) If
   • c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act I, scene ii]:

     […] An the worst fall that ever fell, I hope I shall make shift to go without him.

   • 1885–1888, Richard F[rancis] Burton, transl. and editor, Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night […], Shammar edition, volume (please specify the volume), [London]: […] Burton Club […], →OCLC ↗:

     Thereupon, quoth he, "O woman, for sundry days I have seen thee attend the levée sans a word said; so tell me an thou have any requirement I may grant."

2. (archaic) So long as.

   An it harm none, do what ye will.

3. (archaic) As if; as though.
   • 1797–1798 (date written), [Samuel Taylor Coleridge], “The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere”, in Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems, London: […] J[ohn] & A[rthur] Arch, […], published 1798, →OCLC ↗:
     (original version), lines 61–64:

     At length did cross an Albatross,
     Thorough the Fog it came;
     And an it were a Christian Soul,
     We hail'd it in God's Name.

• German: so
• Italian: se

Borrowed from Georgian ან.

an (plural ans)

1. The first letter of the Georgian alphabet, ა (Mkhedruli), Ⴀ (Asomtavruli) or ⴀ (Nuskhuri).

From the Old English an, on.

1. In each; to or for each; per.

   I was only going twenty miles an hour.

• per

• German: pro, den, das, die
• Italian: al, allo, alla, all'
• Portuguese: o, a, por

Derived from the first letters of army and navy.

1. Abbreviation of Andaman and Nicobar Islands

an (uncountable)

1. (military, US) A set of sizes for screw threads agreed upon and jointly used by the United States Army and Navy.

• Ao (obsolete)

1. Alternative form of Anu