Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. In mythology and legend, a man, often of divine ancestry, who is endowed with great courage and strength, celebrated for his bold exploits, and favored by the gods.
- n. A person noted for feats of courage or nobility of purpose, especially one who has risked or sacrificed his or her life: soldiers and nurses who were heroes in an unpopular war.
- n. A person noted for special achievement in a particular field: the heroes of medicine. See Synonyms at celebrity.
- n. The principal male character in a novel, poem, or dramatic presentation.
- n. Chiefly New York City See submarine. See Regional Note at submarine.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In classical mythology, a superior being, distinguished from ordinary men chiefly by greater physical strength, courage, and ability, at the time of the Homeric poems still regarded as mortal, but from the time of Hesiod (about the eighth century b. c.) regarded as intermediate in nature between gods and men (a demigod), and immortal. Except in the case of Hercules, the Greek cult of heroes was essentially local, each country, region, or even town holding its own in especial honor. Thus Theseus was the national hero of Attica, Ajax was especially honored in Salamis, Amphiaraus at Orchomenus; while Lycurgus became a hero in Sparta, and Hesiod himself in Bœotia. The ancient veneration of heroes was to some extent parallel with that now paid to the saints of Christianity.
- n. A man of distinguished valor, intrepidity, or enterprise in danger; a prominent or central personage in any remarkable action or event; one who exhibits extraordinary courage, firmness, fortitude, or intellectual greatness in any course of action.
- n. The principal male personage in a poem, play, or story, or the person who has the chief place and share in the transactions related, as Achilles in the Iliad, Odysseus (Ulysses) in the Odyssey, Æneas in the Æneid.
- n. A person regarded as heroic; one invested by opinion with heroic qualities.
Wiktionary
- n. this sense?) A real or mythical person of great bravery who carries out extraordinary deeds.
- n. A role model.
- n. The main protagonist in a work of fiction.
- n. A large sandwich made from meats and cheeses; a hero sandwich.
- n. The product chosen from several candidates to be photographed.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Myth.) An illustrious man, supposed to be exalted, after death, to a place among the gods; a demigod, as Hercules.
- n. A man of distinguished valor or enterprise in danger, or fortitude in suffering; a prominent or central personage in any remarkable action or event; hence, a great or illustrious person.
- n. The principal personage in a poem, story, and the like, or the person who has the principal share in the transactions related; as Achilles in the Iliad, Ulysses in the Odyssey, and Æneas in the Æneid.
WordNet 3.0
- n. (Greek mythology) priestess of Aphrodite who killed herself when her lover Leander drowned while trying to swim the Hellespont to see her
- n. a man distinguished by exceptional courage and nobility and strength
- n. someone who fights for a cause
- n. Greek mathematician and inventor who devised a way to determine the area of a triangle and who described various mechanical devices (first century)
- n. a large sandwich made of a long crusty roll split lengthwise and filled with meats and cheese (and tomato and onion and lettuce and condiments); different names are used in different sections of the United States
- n. (classical mythology) a being of great strength and courage celebrated for bold exploits; often the offspring of a mortal and a god
- n. the principal character in a play or movie or novel or poem
Etymologies
- Via Latin hērōs ("hero"), from Ancient Greek ἥρως (hērōs, "demi-god, hero"), from Proto-Indo-European *ser- (“to watch over, protect”). Related to Latin servo ("protect"). Replaced Old English hæleþ. (Wiktionary)
- Earlier heroe, back-formation from heroes, heroes, from Latin hērōēs, pl. of hērōs, from Greek; see ser-1 in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“VIEW FAVORITES yahooBuzzArticleHeadline = 'One man\'s hero is another\'s thief'; yahooBuzzArticleSummary = 'My nomination for our next \'local hero\': Steve Heller.”
“Look as you please; if he had not been here, and a hero, -- a _hero_, -- I should be devoured by the flames.”
“But somehow or another, the term hero has been cheapened.”
The Huffington Post: Barry Bortnick: Heroism in the Modern Era
“In the same time period, NBC's little show that could, Chuck (8/7c), finds the title hero on a personal mission, tracking down his MIA spy mom (Linda Hamilton, very badass) while pretending to give up the spy game.”
“If Captain Sullenberger doesn't like the label hero, he would probably like sage even less.”
“The title hero is more aligned towards typical vampire behavior as an arrogant haughty alpha leader used to obedience until his dependant is abducted showing a rare weakness and then meeting the sleuth showing that rarity is a little more common than his minion thought.”
“The Phantom stars Ryan Carnes Desperate Housewives, Doctor Who as the title hero and as his alter ego, Chris Walker, in this re-imagined version of the classic comic strip, which has been updated to the present day.”
The Phantom Wears Velcro Sneakers | Major Spoilers - Comic Book Reviews and News
“Cole fills this story, in which the title hero battles some giant bugs, with wonderful intimations of super-speed, and a rather bewildering number of applications of the power in so short an amount of space.”
“Upon first viewing, I was analyzing the minute details of the film so much that I had trouble following the story, which picks up 19 years after the previous film with the title hero Harrison Ford facing off with the Russians during the Red Scare of the 1950s.”
DVD Review: Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
“The title hero is still voiced bySamuel L. Jackson, and Ron Perlman i.e.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘hero’.
-
POL - people in power
daredevil, tzar, king, boss, master, commander, chief, kingpin, top banana, bigwig, big cheese, big wheel and 452 more...
-
Words that are also movies
Unabashedly stolen from a comment made by courier12.
vertigo, serendipity, casablanca, psycho, jaws, fantasia, stagecoach, network, rocky, giant, platoon, unforgiven and 285 more...
-
food collection
bread, peel, pot, chorizo, Filet, olive, fill, Phyllo, dough, bake, mat, pinot and 988 more...
-
people (good)
nouns for good people / words that describe good people.
go to the bad people list
( people, character, descriptor, noun )philanthropist, angel, environmentalist, activist, advocate, volunteer, hero, parent, friend, virtuoso, gentleman, helper and 62 more...
-
He Goes a-Pickarooning
Here be a trove of words and phrases associated (fore or aft) with picarooning / pickarooning, scavenged from Google Books citations.
The Prince Edward Island folksong Mick Riley inspi...wagabone, privateer, at every corner, up and down, pirate, expeditions, life, look, rascals, expedition, literary, adventurers and 53 more...
-
Our John
little teapot, benefactor, japanese schoolgirl, hero, slack bastard, the hammer, creator of wordie..., inner city snail, apprentice jockey, a many-splendored..., flockmaster, fusty nut with no... and 12 more...
-
What is a man?
Masculine archetypes and stereotypes, glorifications and vilifications.
This is in line with Femmesque, though narrower in its aim. I want simply the loaded nouns that denote a man's...cuckold, provider, rapist, messiah, hero, demon lover, animus, the man in the bu..., loser, mr. right, stud, bloke and 18 more...
-
Paladin
heroic mot-i(c)ons
el cid, paladin, hero, pahlevan, lifesaver, dickens, bellerophon, abydos, ramachandra, arminius, saga, Arpad and 42 more...
-
Movies I've Seen
There's a jar I've been adding movie ticket stubs to since about age twelve. I am pleased to have a more accessible way of keeping track of the movies I've seen. Even if some are pretty embarrassin...
ghostbusters, amadeus, miller's crossing, no reservations, hoot, insomnia, master and commander, the matrix, o brother, where ..., night of the comet, the dark knight, tropic thunder and 489 more...
-
The Legend of Zelda
dungeon, ocarina, rupee, triforce, ganon, link, ganondorf, impa, hyrule, majora, mask, temple and 194 more...
-
Writing
immunity, reaching, ingenuity, divinity, affinity, kaleidoscopes, statistics, hope, pictures, linguistics, magenta, mist and 222 more...
-
cindywrites's Words
chiaroscuro, mollycoddle, feckless, evocative, provocative, invocation, beckon, allay, becalm, console, lull, soothe and 479 more...
-
eggplantia5's Words
scintillate, marvel, cranberry, oscillate, triumph, bamboozle, grimace, magical, book, hexagon, cipher, compendium and 2727 more...
-
Miscellany
avid, shard, begone, gibes, romantic, inspiration, dashing, affliction, daring, elocution, hegemony, supercalifragilis... and 97 more...
-
The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
-
The braggadocio recipe
A selection of English* words ending with a vowel (except "y", "ea", ie", "ee", "oo", "ea", "ou") that is REALLY pronounced.
My favorite English words, by the way.
The good twin of The ...braggadocio, recipe, encyclopedia, solo, gnu, flu, maybe, apocope, mini, arrhythmia, folio, stereo and 197 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for hero.

oroboros See beauty. Jan 8, 2008
vanishedone I like this definition by Poets of the Fall (worth it for the weird video):
'Is there a hero somewhere, someone who appears and saves the day:
Someone who holds out a hand and turns back time?
Is there a hero somewhere, someone who will never walk away,
Who doesn't turn a blind eye to a crime?' Dec 18, 2007
elfflame "Do you know what the definition of a hero is? Someone who gets other people killed." - Zoe, "Serenity" Dec 18, 2007