English Online Dictionary. What means yard? What does yard mean?
English
Alternative forms
- yaird (obsolete, Scotland)
- yeard (archaic)
- yerd (obsolete)
- yod (pronunciation spelling)
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /jɑːd/
- (General American) enPR: yärd, IPA(key): /jɑɹd/
- Rhymes: -ɑː(ɹ)d
Etymology 1
From Middle English yerd, yard, ȝerd, ȝeard, from Old English ġeard (“yard, garden, fence, enclosure”), from Proto-West Germanic *gard, from Proto-Germanic *gardaz (“enclosure, yard”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰórdʰos, from Proto-Indo-European *gʰerdʰ- (“to enclose”).
See also Dutch gaard, obsolete German Gart, German Garten, Swedish, Danish and Norwegian Bokmål gård, Norwegian Nynorsk gard, Lithuanian gardas (“pen, enclosure”), Russian го́род (górod, “town”), Serbo-Croatian and Slovene grad ("town"), Albanian gardh (“fence”), Romanian gard, Avestan 𐬔𐬆𐬭𐬆𐬛𐬵𐬀 (gərədha, “dev's cave”), Sanskrit गृह (gṛha)), Medieval Latin gardinus, jardinus. Doublet of garden.
Noun
yard (plural yards)
- A small, usually uncultivated area adjoining or (now especially) within the precincts of a house or other building.
- (US, Canada, Australia) The property surrounding one's house, typically dominated by one's lawn.
- Synonym: (UK) garden
- An enclosed area designated for a specific purpose, e.g. on farms, railways etc.
- A place where moose or deer herd together in winter for pasture, protection, etc.
- (Jamaica, MLE) One’s house or home.
Hyponyms
Derived terms
Translations
Verb
yard (third-person singular simple present yards, present participle yarding, simple past and past participle yarded)
- (transitive) To confine to a yard.
Etymology 2
From Middle English ȝerde, yerd, ȝerd, from Old English ġierd (“branch; rod, staff; measuring stick; yardland”), from Proto-West Germanic *gaʀd, from Proto-Germanic *gazdaz. Cognate with Dutch gard (“twig”), German Gerte and probably related to Latin hasta (“spear”).
Noun
yard (plural yards or (UK colloquial) yard)
- A unit of length equal to 3 feet in the US customary and British imperial systems of measurement, equal to precisely 0.9144 m since 1959 (US) or 1963 (UK).
- Units of similar composition or length in other systems.
- (nautical) Any spar carried aloft.
- (nautical) A long tapered timber hung on a mast to which is bent a sail, and may be further qualified as a square, lateen, or lug yard. The first is hung at right angles to the mast, the latter two hang obliquely.
- (obsolete) A branch, twig, or shoot.
- (obsolete) A staff, rod, or stick.
- (obsolete, medicine) A penis.
- 1774, James Cook, The Journals, Second Voyage, 23 July:
- [T]he testicles are quite exposed, but they wrap a piece of cloth or leafe round the yard which they tye up to the belly to a cord or bandage which they wear round the waist just under the short ribbs and over the belly and so tight that it was a wonder to us how they could endure it.
- (US, slang, uncommon) 100 dollars.
- (obsolete) The yardland, an obsolete English unit of land roughly understood as 30 acres.
- (obsolete) The rod, a surveying unit of (once) 15 or (now) 16 1⁄2 feet.
- (obsolete) The rood, area bound by a square rod, 1⁄4 acre.
Synonyms
- (arm length): See ell
- ($100): See hundred
- (surveying measure): See rod
- (large unit of area): See virgate
- (small unit of area): See rood
Hypernyms
- (unit of area): See virgate
Hyponyms
- (unit of area): See virgate
Derived terms
Translations
Verb
yard (third-person singular simple present yards, present participle yarding, simple past and past participle yarded)
- (intransitive, humorous) To move a yard at a time, as opposed to inching along.
Etymology 3
Clipping of milliard.
Noun
yard (plural yards)
- (finance) 109, A short scale billion; a long scale thousand millions or milliard.
- I need to hedge a yard of yen.
References
Anagrams
- Dray, Dyar, Rady, adry, dray
Czech
Noun
yard m inan
- yard (unit of length)
Declension
Further reading
- yard in Příruční slovník jazyka českého, 1935–1957
- yard in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého, 1960–1971, 1989
French
Etymology
Borrowed from English yard.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /jaʁd/
Noun
yard m (plural yards)
- yard (unit of length)
Further reading
- “yard”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Italian
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from English yard.
Noun
yard f (plural yards)
- yard (unit of length)
- Synonym: iarda
Further reading
- yard in Treccani.it – Vocabolario Treccani on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana
Jamaican Creole
Alternative forms
- yaad, yawd
Etymology
From English yard.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /jɑːd/, /jɔːd/
- Hyphenation: yard
Noun
yard
- home
Noun
yard (plural yard dem or yards dem, quantified yard)
- yard
Further reading
- Richard Allsopp, editor, Dictionary of Caribbean English Usage, Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, 1996 (2003 printing), →ISBN, page 617
Middle English
Noun
yard
- Alternative form of yerd
Romanian
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from English yard.
Noun
yard m (plural yarzi)
- yard