cat (English, verb)
Pronunciation: tags: UK
US
enpr: kăt
ipa: /kæt/
tags: UK
US
ipa: [kʰæt]
tags: UK
US
ipa: [kʰæʔ]
tags: UK
US
tags: Canada
UK
ipa: /kat/
homophone: Cat
homophone: Kat
homophone: khat
homophone: qat
rhymes: -æt
Etymology: From Middle English cat, catte, from Old English catt (“male cat”), catte (“female cat”), from Proto-West Germanic *kattu, from Proto-Germanic *kattuz, generally thought to be from Late Latin cattus (“domestic cat”) (c. 350, Palladius), from Latin catta (c. 75 A.D., Martial), from an Afroasiatic language. This would roughly match how domestic cats themselves spread, as genetic studies suggest they began to spread out of the Near East / Fertile Crescent during the Neolithic (being in Cyprus by 9500 years ago, and Greece and Italy by 2500 years ago), especially after they became popular in Egypt. However, every proposed source word has presented problems. Adolphe Pictet and many subsequent sources refer to Barabra (Nubian) [script needed] (kaddîska) and "Nouba" (Nobiin) ⲕⲁⲇⲓ̄ⲥ (kadīs, “kadīs”) as possible sources or cognates, but M. Lionel Bender says the Nubian word is a loan from Arabic قِطَّة (qiṭṭa). Jean-Paul Savignac suggests the Latin word is from an Egyptian precursor of Coptic ϣⲁⲩ (šau, “tomcat”) suffixed with feminine -t, but John Huehnergard says "the source … was clearly not Egyptian itself, where no analogous form is attested."
It may be a Wanderwort. Kroonen says the word must have existed in Germanic from a very early date, as it shows morphological alternations, and suggests that it might have been borrowed from Uralic, compare Northern Sami gađfe (“female stoat”) and Hungarian hölgy (“stoat; lady, bride”) from Proto-Uralic *käďwä (“female (of a fur animal)”).
Cognates
Related to Scots cat, West Frisian kat, North Frisian kåt and kaat, Dutch kat, Danish kat, Norwegian katt, Swedish katt, German Low German Katt and Katte, German Katze, Alemannic German Chatz, Icelandic köttur, Afrikaans kat, Latin cattus, French chat, Norman cat, Occitan cat, Portuguese gato, Spanish gato, Aromanian cãtush, Scottish Gaelic cat, Irish cat, Breton kazh, Welsh cath, Cornish kath, as well as Ancient Greek κάττα (kátta), Greek γάτα (gáta), Turkish kedi, and from the same ultimate source Russian кот (kot), Ukrainian кіт (kit), Belarusian кот (kot), Polish kot, Kashubian kòt, Lithuanian katė, and more distantly Armenian կատու (katu), Basque katu, Arabic قِطَّة (qiṭṭa) alongside dialectal Maghrebi Arabic قَطُّوس (qaṭṭūs) (from Berber, probably from Latin).
Definitions: examples: text: The anchors were catted at the bows of the yacht […]
ref: 1922, Francis Lynde, Pirates’ Hope, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, page 226:
type: quote
bold_text_offsets: 17
23
topics: nautical
transport
synonyms: cathead#Verb
glosses: To hoist (an anchor) by its ring so that it hangs at the cathead.
tags: transitive
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To flog with a cat-o'-nine-tails.
tags: transitive
glosses: To vomit.
tags: slang
examples: text: "He doesn't realize that I know," Lord Callan said, "but it's been pretty obvious that most of his catting about London's darker alleys has been a search for his origins.
ref: 1998, Mary Spencer, Lady’s Wager, page 324:
type: quote
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106
text: This was going to be my first try at catting out. I went looking for somebody to cat with me.
ref: 2010, Claude Brown, Manchild in the Promised Land, page 18:
type: quote
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40
37
44
81
84
text: My own dear wife could have tended to his needs if she hadn't been out catting.
ref: 2012, Valerie Hansen, Wages of Sin:
type: quote
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78
glosses: To go wandering at night.
examples: text: Men from young to middleaged, with matt faces, vivacious and brightly dressed, catted together in gay groups.
ref: 1932, Hugh Brooke, Man Made Angry, page 134:
type: quote
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85
text: They smiled, touched, rolled their eyes and raised their eyebrows, as they relived the audition and catted about some of their competition.
ref: 1996, Alistair Boyle, The Unlucky Seven:
type: quote
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106
text: In the story, Lady Ina gossiped and catted about a parade of the rich and famous—Jackie Kennedy looking like an exaggerated version of herself, Princess Margaret so boring she made people fall asleep, Gloria Vanderbilt so ditzy she didn't recognize her first husband.
ref: 2016, Melanie Benjamin, The Swans of Fifth Avenue, page 293:
type: quote
bold_text_offsets: 36
42
glosses: To gossip in a catty manner.
Forms: form: cats
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: catting
tags: participle
present
form: catted
tags: participle
past
form: catted
tags: past
form: catte
tags: alternative
Related terms: Burmese
feline
kitten
kitty
Maine Coon
Manx
meow
miaow
mog
moggie
moggy
nine lives
Persian
purr
Russian Blue
Schrödinger’s cat
Siamese
tabby