What is the meaning of hen?

Answer 1

In English there are no masculine or feminine forms. English uses gender specific nouns for male or female.

The gender noun for a female chicken is hen.

The most common gender noun for a male chicken is rooster.

Hens are female chickens over one year old, before that they are pullets.

Males under one year are cockerels and once they reach sexual maturity and one year old they are known as roosters.

The noun hen is also a word for a female:

• crow
• dove
• finch
• guinea fowl
• gull
• heron
• hummingbird
• jay
• lark
• lyrebird
• magpie
• nightingale
• ostrich
• parrot
• partridge
• pheasant
• pigeon
• quail

The noun for a male of these species is cock

Other species for which the noun for a female is hen are:

• hawk; the noun for a male is tiercel
• turkey; the noun for a male is tom
• the noun for a female duck is duck or hen; the noun for a male is drake

Answer 2

Hen means a female bird.