noun
- an inhabitant of a town, especially a member of the middle class; citizen.
noun
- a member of the trading or mercantile class of a medieval city
- a respectable citizen; bourgeois
- archaic a citizen or inhabitant of a corporate town, esp on the Continent
- Southern African history
- a citizen of the Cape Colony or of one of the Transvaal and Free State republics
- (as modifier)burgher troops
1560s, “freeman of a burgh,” from Middle Dutch burgher or German Bürger, from Middle High German burger, from Old High German burgari “inhabitant of a fortress,” from burg “fortress, citadel” (see borough). Burgh, as a native variant of borough, persists in Scottish English (cf. Edinburgh).