BIER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does bier mean? 

• BIER (noun)
  The noun BIER has 2 senses:

1. a coffin along with its stand

2. a stand to support a corpse or a coffin prior to burial

  Familiarity information: BIER used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• BIER (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A coffin along with its stand

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Context example:

we followed the bier to the graveyard

Hypernyms ("bier" is a kind of...):

casket; coffin (box in which a corpse is buried or cremated)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A stand to support a corpse or a coffin prior to burial

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("bier" is a kind of...):

rack; stand (a support for displaying various articles)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "bier"):

catafalque (a decorated bier on which a coffin rests in state during a funeral)

 Context examples 

They brought a hand-bier, and laid him on it, and covered him with a flag, and took him up and bore him on towards the houses.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Everywhere I turn I see the same figure—her bloodless arms and relaxed form flung by the murderer on its bridal bier.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Here was a poor girl putting aside the terrors which she naturally had of death to go watch alone by the bier of the mistress whom she loved, so that the poor clay might not be lonely till laid to eternal rest....

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

So they laid her down upon a bier, and all seven watched and bewailed her three whole days; and then they thought they would bury her: but her cheeks were still rosy; and her face looked just as it did while she was alive; so they said, We will never bury her in the cold ground.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

But when they set the bier down on the threshold, they looked at one another, and at me, and whispered.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)