FREE STATE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does Free State mean? 

• FREE STATE (noun)
  The noun FREE STATE has 3 senses:

1. a Mid-Atlantic state; one of the original 13 colonies

2. any state prohibiting slavery prior to the American Civil War

3. a province in central South Africa that was colonized by the Boers; named Free State in 1997

  Familiarity information: FREE STATE used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• FREE STATE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A Mid-Atlantic state; one of the original 13 colonies

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Synonyms:

Free State; Maryland; MD; Md.; Old Line State

Instance hypernyms:

American state (one of the 50 states of the United States)

Meronyms (parts of "Free State"):

Susquehanna; Susquehanna River (a river in the northeastern United States that rises in New York and flows southward through Pennsylvania and Maryland into Chesapeake Bay)

Potomac; Potomac River (a river in the east central United States; rises in West Virginia in the Appalachian Mountains and flows eastward, forming the boundary between Maryland and Virginia, to the Chesapeake Bay)

Chesapeake Bay (a large inlet of the North Atlantic between Virginia and Maryland; fed by Susquehanna River)

Hagerstown (a town in northern Maryland)

Frederick (a town in northern Maryland to the west of Baltimore)

Fort George G. Meade; Fort George Gordon Meade; Fort Meade (a United States Army base in Maryland; headquarters of the National Security Agency)

Baltimore (the largest city in Maryland; a major seaport and industrial center)

Annapolis; capital of Maryland (state capital of Maryland; site of the United States Naval Academy)

Aberdeen (a town in northeastern Maryland)

Holonyms ("Free State" is a part of...):

America; the States; U.S.; U.S.A.; United States; United States of America; US; USA (North American republic containing 50 states - 48 conterminous states in North America plus Alaska in northwest North America and the Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean; achieved independence in 1776)

Mid-Atlantic states (a region of the eastern United States comprising New York and New Jersey and Pennsylvania and Delaware and Maryland)

South (the region of the United States lying to the south of the Mason-Dixon line)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Any state prohibiting slavery prior to the American Civil War

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Hypernyms ("free state" is a kind of...):

American state (one of the 50 states of the United States)

Holonyms ("free state" is a part of...):

North; Union (the United States (especially the northern states during the American Civil War))

Antonym:

slave state (any of the southern states in which slavery was legal prior to the American Civil War)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A province in central South Africa that was colonized by the Boers; named Free State in 1997

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Synonyms:

Free State; Orange Free State

Instance hypernyms:

province; state (the territory occupied by one of the constituent administrative districts of a nation)

Holonyms ("Free State" is a part of...):

Republic of South Africa; South Africa (a republic at the southernmost part of Africa; achieved independence from the United Kingdom in 1910; first European settlers were Dutch (known as Boers))

 Context examples 

A shared facility which maintains a breeding stock of animals in a disease-free state.

(Animal Barrier Facility, NCI Thesaurus)