Definition of "proper"

Suitable.

1. Suited or acceptable to the purpose or circumstances; fit, suitable.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • The proper study of mankind is man.

     1733, [Alexander Pope], An Essay on Man. […], (please specify |epistle=I to IV), London: Printed for J[ohn] Wilford, […]

   • One of the hidden glories of Victorian engineering is proper drains. Isolating a city’s effluent and shipping it away in underground sewers has probably saved more lives than any medical procedure except vaccination.

     2014 June 14, “It's a gas”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8891

2. Following the established standards of behavior or manners; correct or decorous.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • This new-comer was a man who in any company would have seemed striking. […] Indeed, all his features were in large mold, like the man himself, as though he had come from a day when skin garments made the proper garb of men.

     1910, Emerson Hough, chapter I, in The Purchase Price: Or The Cause of Compromise, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company

   • The Nippy became a national icon, symbolic of the girl next door, always approachable and proper; […]

     2014, Paul Chrystal, Tea: A Very British Beverage

Possessed, related.

1. (grammar) Used to designate a particular person, place, or thing. Proper nouns are usually written with an initial capital letter.  examples

2. Pertaining exclusively to a specific thing or person; particular.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • They have a proper saint almost for every peculiar infirmity: for poison, gouts, agues […].

     1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps

   • those higher and peculiar attributes […] which constitute our proper humanity

     1829, James Marsh, Preliminary Essay to Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Aids to Reflection

3. (usually postpositive) In the strict sense; within the strict definition or core (of a specified place, taxonomic order, idea, etc).  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • These are divided into two great families, the vipers proper (Viperidae) and the pit-vipers (Crotalidae).

     1893, Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences

   • Siberia, though it stands outside the territorial confines of Russia proper, constitutes an essentially component part […] . Outer Mongolia, [so called] to distinguish it from Inner Mongolia, which lies nearer to China proper, revolted and declared its independence.

     1976, Eu-Yang Kwang, The political reconstruction of China, page 165

   • Hence, this border is still blurred, raising the question whether traumatic life events induce sadness/distress – which is self-evident – or depression proper and, secondly, whether sadness/distress is a precursor or pacemaker of depression.

     2004, Stress, the Brain and Depression, page 24

4. Belonging to oneself or itself; own.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • a man so boldThat dares do justice on my proper son

     c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act V, scene ii]

   • Now learn the difference, at your proper cost, / Betwixt true valour and an empty boast.

     1717, John Dryden, Meleager and Atalanta

   • every country, and more than that, every private place, hath his proper remedies growing in it, particular almost to the domineering and most frequent maladies of it.

     1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps

   • Each animal has its proper pleasure, and the proper pleasure of man is connected with reason.

     1946, Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy, I.20

5. (heraldry) Portrayed in natural or usual coloration, as opposed to conventional tinctures.  examples

6. (mathematics) Being strictly part of some other thing (not necessarily explicitly mentioned, but of definitional importance), and not being the thing itself.  examples

7. (mathematics, physics) Eigen-; designating a function or value which is an eigenfunction or eigenvalue.  examples

Accurate, strictly applied.

1. Excellent, of high quality; such as the specific person or thing should ideally be. (Now often merged with later senses.)  examples

2. (now regional) Attractive, elegant.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • The same tyme was Moses borne, and was a propper [translating ἀστεῖος (asteîos)] childe in the sight of God, which was norisshed up in his fathers housse thre monethes.

     1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt […] (Tyndale Bible), [Worms, Germany: Peter Schöffer], Acts vij]

3. (often postpositive) In the very strictest sense of the word.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • Though unusual in the Dublin area he knew that it was not by any means unknown for desperadoes who had next to nothing to live on to be abroad waylaying and generally terrorising peaceable pedestrians by placing a pistol at their head in some secluded spot outside the city proper […].

     1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 16]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […]

4. (now colloquial) Utter, complete.  examples

(UK, colloquial) properly; thoroughly; completely.  quotations  examples

(nonstandard, colloquial) properly.  quotations

(obsolete) Something set apart for a special use.

(Christianity) A part of the Christian liturgy that varies according to the date.  examples