common

common
    adj 1: belonging to or participated in by a community as a
           whole; public; "for the common good"; "common lands are
           set aside for use by all members of a community" [ant:
           {individual}, {single}]
    2: having no special distinction or quality; widely known or
       commonly encountered; average or ordinary or usual; "the
       common man"; "a common sailor"; "the common cold"; "a common
       nuisance"; "followed common procedure"; "it is common
       knowledge that she lives alone"; "the common housefly"; "a
       common brand of soap" [ant: {uncommon}]
    3: common to or shared by two or more parties; "a common
       friend"; "the mutual interests of management and labor" [syn:
       {common}, {mutual}]
    4: commonly encountered; "a common (or familiar) complaint";
       "the usual greeting" [syn: {common}, {usual}]
    5: being or characteristic of or appropriate to everyday
       language; "common parlance"; "a vernacular term"; "vernacular
       speakers"; "the vulgar tongue of the masses"; "the technical
       and vulgar names for an animal species" [syn: {common},
       {vernacular}, {vulgar}]
    6: of or associated with the great masses of people; "the common
       people in those days suffered greatly"; "behavior that
       branded him as common"; "his square plebeian nose"; "a vulgar
       and objectionable person"; "the unwashed masses" [syn:
       {common}, {plebeian}, {vulgar}, {unwashed}]
    7: of low or inferior quality or value; "of what coarse metal ye
       are molded"- Shakespeare; "produced...the common cloths used
       by the poorer population" [syn: {coarse}, {common}]
    8: lacking refinement or cultivation or taste; "he had coarse
       manners but a first-rate mind"; "behavior that branded him as
       common"; "an untutored and uncouth human being"; "an uncouth
       soldier--a real tough guy"; "appealing to the vulgar taste
       for violence"; "the vulgar display of the newly rich" [syn:
       {coarse}, {common}, {rough-cut}, {uncouth}, {vulgar}]
    9: to be expected; standard; "common decency"
    n 1: a piece of open land for recreational use in an urban area;
         "they went for a walk in the park" [syn: {park}, {commons},
         {common}, {green}]
    

Common \Com"mon\, a. [Compar. {Commoner}; superl. {Commonest}.]
   [OE. commun, comon, OF. comun, F. commun, fr. L. communis;
   com- + munis ready to be of service; cf. Skr. mi to make
   fast, set up, build, Goth. gamains common, G. gemein, and E.
   mean low, common. Cf. {Immunity}, {Commune}, n. & v.]
   1. Belonging or relating equally, or similarly, to more than
      one; as, you and I have a common interest in the property.
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            Though life and sense be common to men and brutes.
                                                  --Sir M. Hale.
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   2. Belonging to or shared by, affecting or serving, all the
      members of a class, considered together; general; public;
      as, properties common to all plants; the common schools;
      the Book of Common Prayer.
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            Such actions as the common good requireth. --Hooker.
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            The common enemy of man.              --Shak.
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   3. Often met with; usual; frequent; customary.
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            Grief more than common grief.         --Shak.
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   4. Not distinguished or exceptional; inconspicuous; ordinary;
      plebeian; -- often in a depreciatory sense.
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            The honest, heart-felt enjoyment of common life.
                                                  --W. Irving.
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            This fact was infamous
            And ill beseeming any common man,
            Much more a knight, a captain and a leader. --Shak.
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            Above the vulgar flight of common souls. --A.
                                                  Murphy.
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   5. Profane; polluted. [Obs.]
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            What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.
                                                  --Acts x. 15.
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   6. Given to habits of lewdness; prostitute.
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            A dame who herself was common.        --L'Estrange.
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   {Common bar} (Law) Same as {Blank bar}, under {Blank}.

   {Common barrator} (Law), one who makes a business of
      instigating litigation.

   {Common Bench}, a name sometimes given to the English Court
      of Common Pleas.

   {Common brawler} (Law), one addicted to public brawling and
      quarreling. See {Brawler}.

   {Common carrier} (Law), one who undertakes the office of
      carrying (goods or persons) for hire. Such a carrier is
      bound to carry in all cases when he has accommodation, and
      when his fixed price is tendered, and he is liable for all
      losses and injuries to the goods, except those which
      happen in consequence of the act of God, or of the enemies
      of the country, or of the owner of the property himself.
      

   {Common chord} (Mus.), a chord consisting of the fundamental
      tone, with its third and fifth.

   {Common council}, the representative (legislative) body, or
      the lower branch of the representative body, of a city or
      other municipal corporation.

   {Common crier}, the crier of a town or city.

   {Common divisor} (Math.), a number or quantity that divides
      two or more numbers or quantities without a remainder; a
      common measure.

   {Common gender} (Gram.), the gender comprising words that may
      be of either the masculine or the feminine gender.

   {Common law}, a system of jurisprudence developing under the
      guidance of the courts so as to apply a consistent and
      reasonable rule to each litigated case. It may be
      superseded by statute, but unless superseded it controls.
      --Wharton.

   Note: It is by others defined as the unwritten law
         (especially of England), the law that receives its
         binding force from immemorial usage and universal
         reception, as ascertained and expressed in the
         judgments of the courts. This term is often used in
         contradistinction from {statute law}. Many use it to
         designate a law common to the whole country. It is also
         used to designate the whole body of English (or other)
         law, as distinguished from its subdivisions, local,
         civil, admiralty, equity, etc. See {Law}.

   {Common lawyer}, one versed in common law.

   {Common lewdness} (Law), the habitual performance of lewd
      acts in public.

   {Common multiple} (Arith.) See under {Multiple}.

   {Common noun} (Gram.), the name of any one of a class of
      objects, as distinguished from a proper noun (the name of
      a particular person or thing).

   {Common nuisance} (Law), that which is deleterious to the
      health or comfort or sense of decency of the community at
      large.

   {Common pleas}, one of the three superior courts of common
      law at Westminster, presided over by a chief justice and
      four puisne judges. Its jurisdiction is confined to civil
      matters. Courts bearing this title exist in several of the
      United States, having, however, in some cases, both civil
      and criminal jurisdiction extending over the whole State.
      In other States the jurisdiction of the common pleas is
      limited to a county, and it is sometimes called a {county
      court}. Its powers are generally defined by statute.

   {Common prayer}, the liturgy of the Church of England, or of
      the Protestant Episcopal church of the United States,
      which all its clergy are enjoined to use. It is contained
      in the Book of Common Prayer.

   {Common school}, a school maintained at the public expense,
      and open to all.

   {Common scold} (Law), a woman addicted to scolding
      indiscriminately, in public.

   {Common seal}, a seal adopted and used by a corporation.

   {Common sense}.
      (a) A supposed sense which was held to be the common bond
          of all the others. [Obs.] --Trench.
      (b) Sound judgment. See under {Sense}.

   {Common time} (Mus.), that variety of time in which the
      measure consists of two or of four equal portions.

   {In common}, equally with another, or with others; owned,
      shared, or used, in community with others; affecting or
      affected equally.

   {Out of the common}, uncommon; extraordinary.

   {Tenant in common}, one holding real or personal property in
      common with others, having distinct but undivided
      interests. See {Joint tenant}, under {Joint}.

   {To make common cause with}, to join or ally one's self with.

   Syn: General; public; popular; national; universal; frequent;
        ordinary; customary; usual; familiar; habitual; vulgar;
        mean; trite; stale; threadbare; commonplace. See
        {Mutual}, {Ordinary}, {General}.
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Common \Com"mon\, n.
   1. The people; the community. [Obs.] "The weal o' the
      common." --Shak.
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   2. An inclosed or uninclosed tract of ground for pleasure,
      for pasturage, etc., the use of which belongs to the
      public; or to a number of persons.
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   3. (Law) The right of taking a profit in the land of another,
      in common either with the owner or with other persons; --
      so called from the community of interest which arises
      between the claimant of the right and the owner of the
      soil, or between the claimants and other commoners
      entitled to the same right.
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   {Common appendant}, a right belonging to the owners or
      occupiers of arable land to put commonable beasts upon the
      waste land in the manor where they dwell.

   {Common appurtenant}, a similar right applying to lands in
      other manors, or extending to other beasts, besides those
      which are generally commonable, as hogs.

   {Common because of vicinage} or {Common because of
   neighborhood}, the right of the inhabitants of each of two
      townships, lying contiguous to each other, which have
      usually intercommoned with one another, to let their
      beasts stray into the other's fields. - 

   {Common in gross} or {Common at large}, a common annexed to a
      man's person, being granted to him and his heirs by deed;
      or it may be claimed by prescriptive right, as by a parson
      of a church or other corporation sole. --Blackstone.

   {Common of estovers}, the right of taking wood from another's
      estate.

   {Common of pasture}, the right of feeding beasts on the land
      of another. --Burill.

   {Common of piscary}, the right of fishing in waters belonging
      to another.

   {Common of turbary}, the right of digging turf upon the
      ground of another.
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Common \Com"mon\, v. i.
   1. To converse together; to discourse; to confer. [Obs.]
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            Embassadors were sent upon both parts, and divers
            means of entreaty were commoned of.   --Grafton.
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   2. To participate. [Obs.] --Sir T. More.
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   3. To have a joint right with others in common ground.
      --Johnson.
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   4. To board together; to eat at a table in common.
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   Common
 <colon>. Rare: dots; [two-spot].
   ;   Common: <semicolon>; semi. Rare: weenie; [hybrid], pit-thwong.
   < > Common: <less/greater than>; bra/ket; l/r angle; l/r angle
    bracket; l/r broket. Rare: from/{into, towards}; read from/write to;
    suck/blow; comes-from/gozinta; in/out; crunch/zap (all from UNIX);
    tic/tac; [angle/right angle].
   =   Common: <equals>; gets; takes. Rare: quadrathorpe; [half-mesh].
   ?   Common: query; <question mark>; {ques} . Rare: quiz; whatmark;
    [what]; wildchar; huh; hook; buttonhook; hunchback.
   @   Common: at sign; at; strudel. Rare: each; vortex; whorl;
    [whirlpool]; cyclone; snail; ape; cat; rose; cabbage; <commercial at>.
   V   Rare: [book].
   [ ] Common: l/r square bracket; l/r bracket; <opening/closing
    bracket>; bracket/unbracket. Rare: square/unsquare; [U turn/U turn
    back].
   \   Common: backslash, hack, whack; escape (from C/UNIX); reverse slash;
    slosh; backslant; backwhack. Rare: bash; <reverse slant>; reversed
    virgule; [backslat].
   ^   Common: hat; control; uparrow; caret; <circumflex>. Rare: xor sign,
    chevron; [shark (or shark-fin)]; to the (`to the power of'); fang;
    pointer (in Pascal).
   _   Common: <underline>; underscore; underbar; under. Rare: score;
    backarrow; skid; [flatworm].
   `   Common: backquote; left quote; left single quote; open quote; <grave
    accent>; grave. Rare: backprime; [backspark]; unapostrophe; birk;
    blugle; back tick; back glitch; push; <opening single quotation mark>;
    quasiquote.
   { } Common: o/c brace; l/r brace; l/r squiggly; l/r squiggly
    bracket/brace; l/r curly bracket/brace; <opening/closing brace>. Rare:
    brace/unbrace; curly/uncurly; leftit/rytit; l/r squirrelly;
    [embrace/bracelet]. A balanced pair of these may be called curlies .
   |   Common: bar; or; or-bar; v-bar; pipe; vertical bar. Rare: <vertical
    line>; gozinta; thru; pipesinta (last three from UNIX); [spike].
   ~   Common: <tilde>; squiggle; {twiddle} ; not. Rare: approx; wiggle;
    swung dash; enyay; [sqiggle (sic)].

   The pronunciation of # as `pound' is common in the U.S. but a bad
   idea; {Commonwealth Hackish} has its own, rather more apposite use of
   `pound sign' (confusingly, on British keyboards the L happens to
   replace #; thus Britishers sometimes call # on a U.S.-ASCII keyboard
   `pound', compounding the American error). The U.S. usage derives from
   an old-fashioned commercial practice of using a # suffix to tag pound
   weights on bills of lading. The character is usually pronounced `hash'
   outside the U.S. There are more culture wars over the correct
   pronunciation of this character than any other, which has led to the
   {ha ha only serious} suggestion that it be pronounced "shibboleth"
   (see Judges 12:6 in an Old Testament or Tanakh).

   The `uparrow' name for circumflex and `leftarrow' name for underline
   are historical relics from archaic ASCII (the 1963 version), which had
   these graphics in those character positions rather than the modern
   punctuation characters.

   The `swung dash' or `approximation' sign (?1) is not quite the same as
   tilde ~ in typeset material, but the ASCII tilde serves for both
   (compare {angle brackets}).

   Some other common usages cause odd overlaps. The #, $, >, and &
   characters, for example, are all pronounced "hex" in different
   communities because various assemblers use them as a prefix tag for
   hexadecimal constants (in particular, # in many assembler-programming
   cultures, $ in the 6502 world, > at Texas Instruments, and & on the
   BBC Micro, Sinclair, and some Z80 machines). See also {splat}.

   The inability of ASCII text to correctly represent any of the world's
   other major languages makes the designers' choice of 7 bits look more
   and more like a serious {misfeature} as the use of international
   networks continues to increase (see {software rot}). Hardware and
   software from the U.S. still tends to embody the assumption that ASCII
   is the universal character set and that characters have 7 bits; this
   is a major irritant to people who want to use a character set suited
   to their own languages. Perversely, though, efforts to solve this
   problem by proliferating `national' character sets produce an
   evolutionary pressure to use a smaller subset common to all those in
   use.
    

COMMON. or right of common, English law. An encorporeal hereditament, which 
consists in a profit which a man has in the lands of another. 12 S. & R. 32; 
10 Wend. R. 647; 11 John. R. 498; 2 Bouv. Inst. 1640, et seq. 
     2. Common is of four sorts; of pasture, piscary, turbary and estovers. 
Finch's Law, 157; Co. Litt. 122; 2 Inst. 86; 2 Bl. Com. 32. 
     3. - 1. Common of pasture is a right of feeding one's beasts on 
another's land, and is either appendant, appurtenant, or in gross. 
     4. Common appendant is of common right, and it may be claimed in 
pleading as appendant, without laying a prescription. Hargr. note to 2 Inst. 
122, a note. 
     5. Rights of common appurtenant to the claimant's land are altogether 
independent of the tenure, and do not arise from any absolute necessity; but 
may be annexed to lands in other lordships, or extended to other beasts 
besides. such as are generally commonable. 
     6. Common in gross, or at large, is such as is neither appendant nor 
appurtenant to land, but is annexed to a man's person. All these species of 
pasturable common, may be and usually are limited to number and time; but 
there are also commons without stint, which last all the year. 2 Bl. Com. 
34. 
     7. - 2. Common of piscary is the liberty of fishing in another man's 
water. lb. See Fishery. 
     8. - 3. Common of turbary is the liberty of digging turf in another 
man's ground. Ib. 
     9.-4. Common of estovers is the liberty of taking necessary wood-for 
the use or furniture of a house or farm from another man's estate. Ib.; 10 
Wend. R. 639. See Estovers. 
    10. The right of common is little known in the United States, yet there 
are some regulations to be found in relation to this subject. The 
constitution of Illinois provides for the continuance of certain commons in 
that state. Const. art. 8, s. 8. 
    11. All unappropriated lands on the Chesapeake Bay, on the Shore of the 
sea, or of any river or creek, and the bed of any river or creek, in the 
eastern parts of the commonwealth, ungranted and used as common, it is 
declared by statute in Virginia, shall remain so, and not be subject to 
grant. 1 Virg. Rev. C. 142. 
    12. In most of the cities and towns in the United States, there are 
considerable tracts of land appropriated to public use. These commons were 
generally laid out with the cities or towns where they are found, either by 
the original proprietors or by the early inhabitants. Vide 2 Pick. Rep. 475; 
12 S. & R. 32; 2 Dane's. Ab. 610; 14 Mass. R. 440; 6 Verm. 355. See, in 
general, Vin. Abr. Common; Bac. Abr. Common; Com. Dig. Common; Stark. Ev. 
part 4, p. 383; Cruise on Real Property, h.t.; Metc. & Perk. Dig. Common, 
and Common lands and General fields. 
    

COMMON, TENANTS IN. Tenants in common are such as hold an estate, real or 
personal, by several distinct titles, but by a unity of possession. Vide 
Tenant in common; Estate in common. 
    

427 Moby Thesaurus words for "common":
      Astroturf, Attic, Babbittish, Mickey Mouse, Philistine, Spartan,
      absolute interest, accustomed, adequate, all right,
      artificial turf, ascetic, associated, austere, average,
      back-number, bald, banal, bare, base, baseborn, beggarly,
      below the salt, beneath contempt, benefit, besetting, bewhiskered,
      bourgeois, bowling green, breezy, bromidic, campy, candid, casual,
      central, chaste, cheap, cheesy, civic, civil, claim, classic,
      classical, cliched, coacting, coactive, coadjutant, coadjuvant,
      coarse, cockney, coefficient, collaborative, collective,
      collectivist, collectivistic, colloquial, collusive, combined,
      commensal, commonage, commoners, commonly known, commonplace,
      commons, communal, communalist, communalistic, communist,
      communistic, communitarian, community, commutual, concerted,
      concordant, concurrent, concurring, conjoint, conjunct, conniving,
      contemptible, contingent interest, conventional, conversational,
      cooperant, cooperating, cooperative, corny, corporate,
      cosmopolitan, crummy, current, customary, cut-and-dried, declasse,
      defiled, demeaning, despicable, direct, disadvantaged, dominant,
      down-to-earth, dry, dull, easement, ecumenic, epidemic,
      equitable interest, equity, estate, everyday, fade, fairway,
      familiar, fellow, flat, fourth-class, frank, frequent,
      frequentative, fusty, garden, garden-variety, gaudy, general,
      generic, gimcracky, golf course, golf links, good, grassplot,
      green, greenyard, grounds, habitual, hack, hackney, hackneyed,
      harmonious, harmonized, high-camp, holding, homely, homespun,
      household, humble, humdrum, in common, in the shade, inferior,
      informal, infra dig, insipid, interest, intermediary, intermediate,
      international, irregular, joint, junior, kitschy, lawn, lean, less,
      lesser, like, limitation, low, low-camp, low-class, low-grade,
      low-pressure, low-quality, low-test, lowborn, lowbred, lower,
      lowly, many, many times, matter-of-fact, mean, medial, median,
      mediocre, medium, meretricious, middle-class, middle-of-the-road,
      middling, minor, miserable, moderate, modest, moth-eaten, mundane,
      musty, mutual, national, natural, neat, no great shakes,
      nonclerical, noncompetitive, nondescript, nonstandard, normal,
      normative, not rare, notorious, of common occurrence, oft-repeated,
      oftentime, old hat, open, ordinary, ornery, overused, paltry,
      pandemic, paradise, park, part, pathetic, pedestrian, people,
      percentage, pitiable, pitiful, plain, plain-speaking, plain-spoken,
      plastic, platitudinous, plaza, pleasance, pleasure garden,
      pleasure ground, plebeian, plebeians, poetryless, polluted, poor,
      pop, populace, popular, predominant, predominating, prescriptive,
      prevailing, prevalent, proletarian, prosaic, prosing, prosy,
      proverbial, public, public park, punk, pure, pure and simple,
      putting green, rampant, rank and file, reciprocal, recurrent,
      regnant, regular, regulation, reigning, relaxed, repetitious,
      respective, rife, right, right of entry, routine, rubbishy, rude,
      ruling, run-of-mine, run-of-the-mill, running, rustic, sad,
      satisfactory, scrubby, scruffy, scummy, scurvy, scuzzy,
      second rank, second string, second-best, second-class, second-rate,
      secondary, seedy, servile, set, settlement, severe, shabby,
      shabby-genteel, shared, shoddy, similar, simple, simple-speaking,
      sleazy, sober, social, socialistic, societal, sorry, spare, spoken,
      square, stake, stale, standard, stark, state, stereotyped, stock,
      straightforward, strict settlement, sub, subaltern, subject,
      subordinate, subservient, substandard, suburban, sufficient,
      supranational, symbiotic, synergetic, synergic, synergistic, tacky,
      talked-about, talked-of, tatty, thick-coming, third estate,
      third rank, third string, third-class, third-estate, third-rate,
      threadbare, timeworn, tinny, tired, tiresome, title, tolerable,
      trashy, trite, truistic, trumpery, trust, two-for-a-cent,
      two-for-a-penny, two-way, twopenny, twopenny-halfpenny, typical,
      unadorned, unaffected, unclean, uncompetitive, unconstrained,
      underprivileged, undistinguished, uneducated, unembellished,
      uneventful, unexceptionable, unexceptional, unexciting, unfussy,
      ungenteel, unidealistic, unimaginative, unimpassioned,
      unimpeachable, uninteresting, universal, universally admitted,
      universally recognized, unliterary, unnoteworthy, unoriginal,
      unpoetic, unpoetical, unrefined, unremarkable, unreserved,
      unromantic, unspectacular, unstudied, unvarnished, use, usual,
      valueless, vapid, vernacular, vested interest, vile, village green,
      vulgar, warmed-over, well-kenned, well-known, well-recognized,
      well-understood, well-worn, widely known, wonted, workaday,
      workday, worn, worn out, worn thin, worthless, wretched