pot
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: pŏt
ipa: /pɒt/
rhymes: -ɒt
enpr: pät
ipa: /pɑt/
Forms: form: pots
form: potting
form: potted
form: potted
Etymology: From Middle English pot, potte, from Old English pott (“pot”) and Old French pot (“pot”) (probably from Frankish *pott); both Old English and Frankish from Proto-Germanic *puttaz (“pot”), from Proto-Indo-European *budnós (“a type of vessel”).
Cognate with Saterland Frisian Pot (“pot”), Dutch pot (“pot”), German Low German Pott (“pot”), German Pott (“pot”), Swedish potta (“chamber pot”), Icelandic pottur (“tub, pot”), Old Armenian պոյտն (poytn, “pot, earthen pot”). Also, Old Norse pottr (“pot, tub, basin”).
The sense of ruin or deterioration was originally a general allusion to "being chopped up and tossed in a (normally fiery) pot, like a piece of meat" (i.e. to get wasted or done with (by someone)). The 'clean' slang term which was used in reference to toilet rooms and lavatories apparently derives from English chamberpots, although now usually encountered as potty in the context of children's toilet training.
Senses: examples: text: to pot a plant
glosses: To put (something) into a pot.
examples: text: potted meat
glosses: To preserve by bottling or canning.
topics: business
electrical-engineering
electricity
electromagnetism
electronics
energy
engineering
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
physics
glosses: To package a circuit by encasing it in resin.
topics: ball-games
billiards
games
hobbies
lifestyle
pool
snooker
sports
glosses: To cause a ball to fall into a pocket.
examples: text: The black ball doesn't pot; the red is in the way.
topics: ball-games
billiards
games
hobbies
lifestyle
pool
snooker
sports
glosses: To be capable of being potted.
examples: text: When hunted, it [the jaguar] takes refuge in trees, and this habit is well known to hunters, who pursue it with dogs and pot it when treed.
ref: 1897, Encyclopaedia of Sport:
glosses: To shoot with a firearm.
glosses: To take a pot shot, or haphazard shot, with a firearm.
glosses: To secure; gain; win; bag.
glosses: To send someone to jail, expeditiously.
examples: text: It is less labour to plough than to pot it.
ref: 1623, Owen Feltham, Resolves: Divine, Moral, Political:
glosses: To tipple; to drink.
examples: text: Too much temper likewise prevents the melasses from separating from the sugar when it is potted or put into the hogshead
ref: 1793, Bryan Edwards, History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in the West Indies:
glosses: To drain (e.g. sugar of the molasses) in a perforated cask.
examples: text: Ideally the best Ideally the best way of tackling the problem of toilet training, is to 'pot' your child at set intervals when he is at home, even though he may no longer be a baby, thus establishing a regular routine instead of one at odd intervals.
ref: 1975, Nancie R. Finnie, Handling the Young Cerebral Palsied Child, →ISBN, page 75:
text: If you leave out this “catching" stage altogether and start proper toilet training at, say, eighteen months you will only have to pot your baby about 2000 times for the same effect.
ref: 1978, Penelope Leach, Your Baby & Child from Birth to Age Five, →ISBN, page 225:
text: Do not make the mistake of potting your baby as early as possible, but wait until she gives the signal that she is aware that puddles are somehow to do with her.
ref: 2004, Joan Gomez, Coping with Incontinence, →ISBN, page 33:
text: Of course, if at any stage your child takes a violent dislike to the pot, then I would put it away for a few weeks and then try again, but if the pot is very comfortable, your attitude is calm and you don't over-pot your child (put him on the pot too often or talk about the pot too much), this shouldn't happen.
ref: 2012, Nanny Smith, Nina Grunfeld, Nanny Knows Best: Successful Potty Training, →ISBN:
glosses: To seat a person, usually a young child, on a potty or toilet, typically during toilet teaching.
glosses: To apply a plaster cast to a broken limb.
examples: text: Most Fishneck watermen oystered in winter, using the same small skiffs from which they potted crabs in summer.
ref: 1986, Carolyn Ellis, Fisher Folk: Two Communities on Chesapeake Bay, University Press of Kentucky, →ISBN, page 77:
text: Potting Eels: Except for the mature neshaws, Vineyard eels were potted (caught by pots) in September and October. […] When eeling was good, each pot would catch 25 to 100 pounds of neshaws; some pots would be filled to capacity.
ref: 1994, The Dukes County Intelligencer, volumes 36-37, page 131:
glosses: To catch (a fish, eel, etc) via a pot.
examples: text: With five minutes to go, Trevathan potted his second goal, and finally it was the fullback Taylor who scored.
ref: 1967, Arthur H. Carman, Ranfurly Shield Rugby, page 139:
text: He played for the Oxford Australians against their Cambridge counterparts, and even potted a few goals at picnic Rugby matches.
ref: 1998, Geoffrey Serle: In Tribute, page 20:
topics: ball-games
games
hobbies
lifestyle
rugby
sports
glosses: To score (a drop goal).
Derived terms: pot on