play
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: plā
rhymes: -eɪ
ipa: /pleɪ/
ipa: [pʰleɪ̯]
note: Indic
ipa: /ple(j)/
Forms: form: plays
form: playing
form: played
form: played
Etymology: From Middle English pleyen, playen, pleȝen, plæien, also Middle English plaȝen, plawen (compare English plaw), from Old English pleġan, pleoġan, plæġan, and Old English plegian, pleagian, plagian (“to play, exercise, etc.”), from Proto-West Germanic *plehan (“to care about, be concerned with”) and Proto-West Germanic *plegōn (“to engage, move”), of uncertain origin.
cognates and related terms
Cognate with Scots play (“to act or move briskly, cause to move, stir”), Saterland Frisian pleegje (“to look after, care for, maintain”), West Frisian pleegje, pliigje (“to commit, perform, bedrive”), Middle Dutch pleyen ("to dance, leap for joy, rejoice, be glad"; compare Modern Dutch pleien (“to play a particular children's game”)), Dutch plegen (“to commit, bedrive, practice”), German pflegen (“to care for, be concerned with, attend to, tend”). Related also to Old English plēon (“to risk, endanger”). More at plight, pledge.
The noun is from Middle English pleye, from Old English plæġ, plega, plæġa (“play, quick motion, movement, exercise; (athletic) sport, game; festivity, drama; battle; gear for games, an implement for a game; clapping with the hands, applause”), deverbative of plegian (“to play”); see above.
Senses: examples: text: The children played in the park.
text: A youngster[…]listed some of the things his pet did not do:[…]go on vacation, play in the same way that he did with his friends, and so on.
ref: 2001, Annabelle Sabloff, Reordering the Natural World, Univ. of Toronto Press, page 83:
text: 2003, Anne-Nelly Perret-Clermont et al. (eds.), Joining Society: Social Interaction and Learning in Adolescence and Youth, Cambridge Univ. Press, p.52:
glosses: To act in a manner such that one has fun; to engage in activities expressly for the purpose of recreation or entertainment.
examples: text: Don't play with your food!
text: He's just playing with her affections.
text: Thus Men are apt to play with their Healths and their Lives as they do with their Cloaths: [...]
ref: a. 1700 (date written), William Temple, “Of Health and Long-life”, in Miscellanea. The Third Part. […], London: […] Jonathan Swift, […] Benjamin Tooke, […], published 1701, →OCLC, page 167:
qualifier: see also play with
glosses: To toy or trifle; to act with levity or thoughtlessness; to be careless.
raw_tags: with 'with'
examples: text: He plays on three teams.
text: Who's playing now?
text: play football, play sports, play games
hypernyms: try
glosses: To perform in (a sport); to participate in (a game).
examples: text: He plays left back for Mudchester Rovers
hypernyms: try
glosses: To perform in (a sport); to participate in (a game).
Specifying a particular sporting role or position.
examples: text: We're playing one of the top teams in the next round.
text: England will not be catapulted among the favourites for Euro 2012 as a result of this win, but no victory against Spain is earned easily and it is right they take great heart from their efforts as they now prepare to play Sweden at Wembley on Tuesday.
ref: 2011 November 12, “International friendly: England 1-0 Spain”, in BBC Sport:
hypernyms: try
glosses: To perform in (a sport); to participate in (a game).
To compete against, in a game.
examples: text: Look at the score now ... 23 plays 8!
hypernyms: try
glosses: To perform in (a sport); to participate in (a game).
To be the opposing score to.
raw_tags: in the scoring of games and sports
glosses: To contend or fight using weapons, both as practice or in real life-or-death combats; to engage in martial games; to joust; to fence
examples: text: to play safe, to play fair, to play dirty
text: His mother played false with a smith.
ref: c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:
text: Now here you go again, you say you want your freedom / Well, who am I to keep you down? / It's only right that you should play the way you feel it / But listen carefully to the sound of your loneliness
ref: 1977, “Dreams”, in Stevie Nicks (lyrics), Fleetwood Mac (music), Rumours, performed by Stevie Nicks:
glosses: To act or behave in a stated way.
examples: text: He plays dumb, but actually he's very clever.
text: Thou canst play the rational if thou wilt.
ref: 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC:
text: Playing hard to get is not the same as slamming the door in someone's face.
ref: 1985, Sharon S. Brehm, Intimate Relationships:
text: Now, surveying his final link, he had the nice advantage of being able to play coy with established port cities that desperately wanted his proven railroad.
ref: 1996, Michael P. Malone, James J Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest:
text: Instead, they played dumb, remained silent, and did their classwork.
ref: 2003, John U. Ogbu, Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement, page 194:
glosses: To act or behave in a stated way.
To give a false appearance of being; to pretend to be.
examples: text: Stop playing the fool.
text: No part of the brain plays the role of permanent memory.
text: In plants, the ability to recognize self from nonself plays an important role in fertilization, because self-fertilization will result in less diverse offspring than fertilization with pollen from another individual.
ref: 2013 May-June, Katrina G. Claw, “Rapid Evolution in Eggs and Sperm”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:
glosses: To act as (the indicated role).
examples: text: Who played Scarlett O'Hara in 'Gone with the Wind'?
text: Mister Friel plays Virgil to the narrator's Dante, finding him an apartment, bringing him to the right parties and offering the last word on gay New York.
ref: 1983 December 3, Michael Wilson, “The Same Story Embellished”, in Gay Community News, volume 11, number 20, page 12:
text: I'm not a doctor, but I do play one on TV.
ref: 1984, Chris Robinson, commercial for Vicks Formula 44
text: An opening sequence, featuring a de-aged Ford playing a younger Indy, is a bold and nostalgic gambit, offering a glimpse of what you've missed.
ref: 2023 June 29, City AM, London, page 18, column 2:
glosses: To act as (the indicated role).
To portray (a character) in (a film or theatre).
examples: text: I'll play the piano and you sing.
text: Can you play an instrument?
text: I've practiced the piano off and on, but I still can't play very well.
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To produce music using a musical instrument.
synonyms: word: cook
word: jam
word: cook
word: jam
word: play
word: put on
raw_tags: of a person
examples: text: This piano plays out of tune.
text: If your guitar plays well on fretted strings but annoys you on the open ones, the nut's probably worn out.
ref: 2007, Dan Erlewine, Guitar Player Repair Guide, →ISBN, page 220:
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To produce music.
raw_tags: of a musical instrument
examples: text: You can play the DVD now.
text: Don't play your radio so loud!
text: Play the audio clip to hear how the word is pronounced.
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To operate (a device or media) so as to cause sound (especially music) or moving pictures to be produced.
raw_tags: of a person
examples: text: Do you know how to play Für Elise on the piano?
text: We especially like to play jazz together.
text: She keeps playing 'Achy Breaky Heart' over and over again on her stereo.
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To render (a musical title, compositional style, film title, etc.) using a musical instrument or device.
raw_tags: of a person
examples: text: The juke box is playing our favourite song.
text: The radio was playing in the background.
text: This DVD is scratched and won't play.
text: Channel 9 is playing that old comedy series again.
text: My cassette player won't play this worn-out old tape.
topics: media
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To emit or relay sound (especially music) or moving pictures; (of a device) to operate media.
qualifier: broadcast
raw_tags: of a device
examples: text: His latest film is playing in the local theatre tomorrow.
text: Some kind of lounge music was playing in the background.
topics: broadcasting
entertainment
film
lifestyle
media
music
television
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To be performed, reproduced, or shown.
raw_tags: of a theatrical performance
examples: text: The band is playing large arenas nationwide.
text: I got a hold of Louis (Satchmo) Armstrong's agent and I explained to him on the phone that, "I know you're playing London on Wednesday night. Why don't you come and play the Arena in Windsor on Saturday night?"
ref: 2008, My Life: From Normandy to Hockeytown, →ISBN, page 30:
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To perform or give performances in or at (a venue or location).
raw_tags: of a theatrical company or band
examples: text: to play a comedy
glosses: To produce sound (especially music), moving pictures, or theatrical performance.
To act or perform (a play).
examples: text: The fountain plays.
text: The leaves played in the wind.
text: All fame is foreign but of true desert,
 Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart.
ref: 1733, [Alexander Pope], An Essay on Man. […], (please specify |epistle=I to IV), London: […] J[ohn] Wilford, […], →OCLC:
glosses: To move briskly, sweepingly, back and forth, in a directed manner, etc.
To move in a light or brisk manner.
examples: text: The torch beam played around the room.
text: They played the jet of water onto the seat of the fire.
text: to play cannon upon a fortification
text: The setting sun
 Plays on their shining arms and burnished helmets.
ref: 1712 (date written), [Joseph] Addison, Cato, a Tragedy. […], London: […] J[acob] Tonson, […], published 1713, →OCLC, Act I, scene v, page 1:
text: The colonel and his sponsor made a queer contrast: Greystone [the sponsor] long and stringy, with a face that seemed as if a cold wind was eternally playing on it.
ref: 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter I, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
text: The Poet and the Painter
Casting shadows on the water
As the sun plays on the infantry
Returning from the sea.
ref: 1972, “Thick As A Brick”, Ian Anderson (lyrics), performed by Jethro Tull:
glosses: To move briskly, sweepingly, back and forth, in a directed manner, etc.
To move so as to fall upon or sweep across something, or to direct or operate (something) in such a manner.
examples: text: the waving sedges play with wind
ref: c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act INDUCTION, scene ii]:
text: The heart beats, the blood circulates, the lungs play.
ref: 1705, George Cheyne, Philosophical Principles of Religion:
glosses: To move briskly, sweepingly, back and forth, in a directed manner, etc.
To move in an alternating or reciprocal manner; to move to and fro.
examples: text: That was a great shot he played!
text: He played the blue ball, but the green would have been a better choice.
text: When you're in a team, you have to play your part.
text: to play a trump in a card game, to play tricks, to play a joke
text: Nature here
 Wantoned as in her prime, and played at will
 Her virgin fancies.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book V”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
text: The Bat—they called him the Bat.[…]. He'd never been in stir, the bulls had never mugged him, he didn't run with a mob, he played a lone hand, and fenced his stuff so that even the fence couldn't swear he knew his face.
ref: 1920, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Avery Hopwood, chapter I, in The Bat: A Novel from the Play (Dell Book; 241), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing Company, →OCLC:
glosses: To bring into action or motion; to exhibit in action; to execute or deploy.
examples: text: The bank robbers have three hostages inside, so we're going to have to play this very carefully.
glosses: To handle or deal with (a matter or situation) in a stated way.
examples: text: He made a fortune on Wall Street, playing the markets.
text: In this business you have to play the percentages.
glosses: To handle or deal with (something) in a calculating manner intended to achieve profit or gain.
examples: text: This policy plays well with younger voters.
text: How will this play in the swing states?
glosses: To be received or accepted (in a given way); to go down.
examples: text: “I play, comparatively, very little; I don't drink a fifth part so much as half the people I live with; and I reckon myself, upon the whole, a very orderly, sober fellow.”
ref: 1791, Charlotte Smith, Celestina, Broadview, published 2004, page 407:
glosses: To gamble.
glosses: To keep in play, as a hooked fish in order to land it.
examples: text: You played me!
text: If this our song, you're the composer
 I'm not a game, but you play me anyway
ref: 2020, “Ballad Of You & I”, performed by Hotel Lux:
synonyms: defraud
glosses: To manipulate, deceive, or swindle.
examples: text: They don't play with the rules around here.
text: He grew serious. “Sorry, E.M. Just fucking around.”
“Well, I don’t play like that and you know it.”
ref: 2016, T. Styles, “seventeen”, in Clown Niggas, United States of America: The Cartel Publications, →ISBN, →LCCN, page 161:
qualifier: African-American Vernacular
glosses: To kid; to joke; to say something for amusement; to act, or to treat something, unseriously.
examples: text: Her proper face
 I not descerned in that darkesome shade,
 But weend it was my loue, with whom he playd.
ref: 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
text: Cheree, Cheree / Je t'adore, baby / I love you / Oh, come play with me
ref: 1977, “Cheree”, in Suicide, performed by Suicide:
synonyms: word: get it on
word: make out
word: have sex
word: approach
word: cohabit
word: company
word: copulate
word: couple
word: engage in sex
word: exchange flesh
word: have intimate relations
word: have marital relations
word: have sex
word: have sexual relations
word: intercourse
word: know
word: know someone in the biblical sense
word: make love
word: mate
word: share a bed
word: sleep together
word: strain
word: bang
word: bauf
word: beat
word: bone
word: boff
word: boink
word: bonk
word: bop
word: bounce
word: breed
word: bump nasties
word: bump uglies
word: catch a dick
word: dance
word: discuss Uganda
word: dip one's pen in someone's inkwell
word: do it
word: do the deed
word: do the nasty
word: eff
word: engender
word: expletive deleted
word: feck
word: frack
word: frak
word: frick
word: frig
word: fuck
word: get busy
word: get down
word: get freaky
word: get it
word: get it on
word: get jiggy
word: get laid
word: get lucky
word: get one's dick wet
word: get one's end away
word: get one's freak on
word: get one's groove on
word: get one's leg over
word: get one's oats
word: get physical
word: get some
word: get the dirty water off one's chest
word: graft the forked tree
word: go all the way
word: haul one's ashes
word: have it away
word: have it off
word: hide the salami
word: hide the sausage
word: hide the wienie
word: hike the Appalachian Trail
word: hook up
word: hump
word: jig-jig
word: knock boots
word: lay pipe
word: lay the pipe
word: make it
word: make out
word: make the beast with two backs
word: make whoopee
word: meddle
word: ming
word: Netflix and chill
word: penetrate
word: pipe
word: pipe down
word: play
word: play hide the sausage
word: pound
word: rail
word: ride
word: rock and roll
word: roger
word: roll around
word: root
word: screw
word: see someone's etchings
word: sex
word: shag
word: shelve
word: show someone one's etchings
word: slap bellies
word: stick
word: tumble
glosses: To take part in amorous activity; to make love; see also play around.
glosses: For additional senses in various idiomatic phrases, see the individual entries, such as play along, play at, play down, play off, play on, play out, play to, play up, etc.