Link Centre Dictionary

mate

UK/meɪt/ US/meɪt/ common uk
noun (9) verb (3)

noun

1.

the officer below the master on a commercial ship

Synonyms
2.

a fellow member of a team

  • “it was his first start against his former teammates”
Synonyms
3.

the partner of an animal (especially a sexual partner)

  • “he loved the mare and all her mates”
  • “camels hate leaving their mates”
4.
5.

an exact duplicate

  • “when a match is found an entry is made in the notebook”
Synonyms
6.
7.

informal term for a friend of the same sex

8.

South American tea-like drink made from leaves of a South American holly called mate

9.

a chess move constituting an inescapable and indefensible attack on the opponent''s king

Synonyms

verb

1.

make love

  • “Birds mate in the Spring”
Synonyms
2.

bring two objects, ideas, or people together

  • “This fact is coupled to the other one”
  • “Matchmaker, can you match my daughter with a nice young man?”
  • “The student was paired with a partner for collaboration on the project”
Synonyms
3.

place an opponent''s king under an attack from which it cannot escape and thus ending the game

  • “Kasparov checkmated his opponent after only a few moves”
Synonyms

Origin

From Middle English mate, a borrowing from Middle Low German mate (“messmate”) (replacing Middle English mett, mette (“table companion, mate, partner”), from Old English ġemetta (“sharer of food, table-guest”)), from Old Saxon gimato, derived from Proto-Germanic *gamatjô, itself from *ga- (“together”) (related to German and Dutch ge-) + *matjô (from *matiz (“food”)), related to Old English mete (“food”)). From the same Middle Low German source stems German Low German Maat (“journeyman, companion”), German Maat (“naval non-commissioned officer”). Cognates include Saterland Frisian Moat (“friend, buddy, comrade, mate”), Dutch maat (“mate, partner, colleague, friend”). More at Old English ġe-, English co-, English meat. Doublet of maat. Compare typologically Latin compāniō (whence companion) (< con- + panis + -ō), Russian однока́шник (odnokášnik) (< одно- (odno-) + ка́ша (káša) + -ник (-nik)).

Phrases

  • Billy no mates
  • Johnny no mates
  • Nigel no mates
  • Norman no mates

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Word family

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WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.