Definition of: common

(kom′ən) adjective
1. Often occurring, met, or seen; frequent or usual; not distinguished or separated from the ordinary; customary; regular: a common occurrence.
2. Pertaining to, connected with, or participated in by two or more persons or things; joint.
3. Belonging to the public: the common schools.
4. The most prevalent or familiar: the common crow.
5. Commonplace; not excellent or distinguished in tone or quality; banal; coarse; vulgar; low.
6. Gram. a Of either gender. b Applicable to any individual of a class. See COMMON NOUN under NOUN.
7. Secular; profane; polluted.
8. In prosody, either long or short; doubtful in quantity.
9. Public or general; widespread: common knowledge.
10. Anat. Formed by or having similar relations with two or more organs: the common carotid artery.
11. Math. Referring to a number or quantity belonging equally to two or more quantities: a common denominator.
—noun
1. Land generally, or a tract of land, considered as the property of the public, in which all persons enjoy equal rights; also, land owned by a town; land open to the use of all.
2. Law A profit or right of one person in the land of another: used in some specific phrases: common of estovers (wood necessary for the house or farm), common of pasture, common of piscary (fishing), common of turbary (cutting turf).
3. Eccl. Sometimes cap. The office composed of psalms, antiphons, lessons, etc., which can be used for any of certain classes of feasts: the common of virgins. [<OF comun <L communis common]
—com′mon·ly adverb
—com′mon·ness noun Synonyms (adj.): cheap, coarse, commonplace, customary, familiar, frequent, general, habitual, low, mean, normal, ordinary, popular, public, threadbare, trite, universal, usual, vile, vulgar. See FREQUENT, GENERAL, HABITUAL, MUTUAL, NORMAL, TRITE, USUAL. Antonyms: exceptional, infrequent, odd, peculiar, rare, singular, unusual.For the following terms, See under the second element: