The Secret Stead is the pen name of a UK-based writer and
The word for today is "neighbour".Neighbour -noun
[ney-ber] (US English neighbor)
1. A person living on adjacent or nearby land; a person situated adjacently or nearby; anything (of the same type of thing as the subject) in an adjacent or nearby position.
2. A nearby object of the same kind. "What is the closest neighbor to the Earth?"
3. A person who lives (or is located) near another.
The word "neighbour" can be found before 900 AD. It comes from the Old English (West Saxon) "nēahgebūr", which means "near dweller" combining "nēah" (near) and "gebūr" (dweller), which is related to "bur" (dwelling), from the Proto-Germanic "(ga)būraz" (a farmer, bower) from the Proto-Indo-European root "bheue-" (to be, exist, grow). This term has cognates in several Germanic languages, reflecting its long history in the English language.
Today, when we think of the word "neighbour" it conjures up the person or persons living closest to us, without us having any say in the matter, but depending on where we live - house, flat or maisonette - our upstairs, downstairs or adjacent neighbours will have a lot of say in how we enjoy the right to live peaceably in our homes. The courts are filled with civil lawsuits and criminal cases when neighbour disputes escalate to harmful levels, and where sometimes even whole neighbourhoods can get involved in the persecution of its residents.
The blessing of a good neighbour, however, can play a quiet, but significant role in our lives. They are the friendly faces we see daily, the helping hands in times of need, and can often become, in a very real sense, those people who live nearby and help us to exist and grow.
Everybody Needs Good Neighbours
Moreover, a search of the word in historical documents finds it in numerous contexts where it is clearly more than just a reference to a person living next door or close by, while Mildred Campbell's The English Yeoman, in finding the right words to define the word "neighbour" as it came to be understood among the countryfolk in the Tudor period, writes that functions which are today performed by nurses, physicians, social workers, secretaries, real estate agents and lawyers were performed by neighbours for each other.
From an institutional perspective, neighbourly relations in our cities are dependent in terms of respecting human rights. Good neighbourly relations promote a peaceful environment, not only between local and urban communities, but national and global ones. In politics, good neighbour policy is attested by 1937, but the term "good neighbour" with reference to U.S. policy toward Latin America was used as early as 1928, by Herbert Hoover, the 31st president of the United States.
If you think about it, much of the havoc in the world is due to a breakdown in neighbourly relations, and yet, we seem to think there are more important issues than getting along with those with which we share our demarcation lines. But as former college American football coach and television analyst Lou Holtz was quoted to have said, “If you burn your neighbour's house down, it doesn't make your house look any better".
It's good advice, but we have a long history of ignoring it - a longer history than the word itself.
Published 1 February, 2026
