pair
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Topics: ball-games
baseball
card-games
computing
cricket
engineering
games
government
hobbies
lifestyle
mathematics
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
politics
rowing
sciences
sports
Etymology: From Middle English paire, from Old French paire, from Latin paria (“equals”), neuter plural of par (“pair”). Related to pār (“equal”, adjective). Compare Saterland Frisian Poor (“pair”), West Frisian pear (“pair”), Dutch paar (“pair”), German Paar (“pair”), Italian paio (“pair”)
Inflected forms:
form: pairs
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: pair
pos: noun
tags: archaic
dialectal
plural
form: pairs
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: pairing
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: paired
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: paired
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: Two alike or identical things taken together; often followed by of.
pos: noun
examples: Ting, ting, ting! went the bell again. Every body sat down; the curtain shook, rose sufficiently high to display several pair of yellow boots paddling about, and there it remained.
Day after day, with the stamp and shuffle of sixty pair of bare feet behind me, each pair under a 60-lb. load.
So, one evening, I made a speech in English with gestures, not one of which was lost to the sixty pairs of eyes before me, and the next morning I started the hammock off in front all right.
Where we once sent love letters in a sealed envelope, or stuck photographs of our children in a family album, now such private material is despatched to servers and clouds operated by people we don't know and will never meet. Perhaps we assume that our name, address and search preferences will be viewed by some unseen pair of corporate eyes, probably not human, and don't mind that much.
I couldn't decide which of the pair of designer shirts I preferred, so I bought the pair.
gloss: Two alike or identical things taken together; often followed by of.
pos: noun
examples: [S]he had finished the second sock, and pulled its pair out of the bag before handing them to her husband.
Must be good at athletics, home repairs, making mince interesting and finding the pair to the other glove.
gloss: Two people in a relationship, partnership or friendship.
pos: noun
examples: Spouses should make a great pair.
gloss: Used with binary nouns (often in the plural to indicate multiple instances, since such nouns are plural only, except in some technical contexts).
pos: noun
examples: a pair of scissors; two pairs of spectacles; several pairs of jeans
gloss: A couple of working animals attached to work together, as by a yoke.
pos: noun
examples: A pair is harder to drive than two mounts with separate riders.
gloss: A poker hand that contains two cards of identical rank, which cannot also count as a better hand.
pos: noun
gloss: A score of zero runs (a duck) in both innings of a two-innings match.
pos: noun
gloss: A double play, two outs recorded in one play.
pos: noun
tags: informal
examples: They turned a pair to end the fifth.
gloss: A doubleheader, two games played on the same day between the same teams.
pos: noun
tags: informal
examples: The Pirates took a pair from the Phillies.
gloss: A boat for two sweep rowers.
pos: noun
gloss: A pair of breasts.
pos: noun
tags: slang
examples: She's got a gorgeous pair.
gloss: A pair of testicles.
pos: noun
tags: slang
examples: Grow a pair, mate.
gloss: The exclusion of one member of a parliamentary party from a vote, if a member of the other party is absent for important personal reasons.
pos: noun
tags: Australia
gloss: Two members of opposite parties or opinion, as in a parliamentary body, who mutually agree not to vote on a given question, or on issues of a party nature during a specified time.
pos: noun
examples: There were two pairs on the final vote.
One-line business is optional; three-line business compulsory; when it's two lines you have to be on parade unless you have secured a 'pair' and cleared it with the 'pairing whip'.
gloss: A number of things resembling one another, or belonging together; a set.
pos: noun
tags: archaic
examples: Thou lieſt; I ha’ nothing buy my ſkin, / And my cloaths; my ſword here, and my ſelf; / Two Crowns in my pocket; two pair of Cards; / And three falſe Dice: I can ſwim like a fiſh / Raſcal, nothing to hinder me.
It would never do, you know, for me to be plunging myself into poverty and shabbiness and love in one room up three pair of stairs, and all that sort of thing.
gloss: In a mechanism, two elements, or bodies, which are so applied to each other as to mutually constrain relative motion; named in accordance with the motion it permits, as in turning pair, sliding pair, twisting pair.
pos: noun
gloss: To group into one or more sets of two.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: The wedding guests were paired boy/girl and groom's party/bride's party.
Brown as I am, an Ethiopian dame / Inspired young Perseus with a gen’rous flame; / Turtles and doves of diff’ring hues unite, / And glossy jet is paired with shining white.
gloss: to link two electronic devices wirelessly together, especially through a protocol such as Bluetooth.
pos: verb
examples: It was not possible to pair my smartphone with an incompatible smartwatch.
If your computer has a built-in, non-Microsoft transceiver, you can pair the device directly to the computer by using your computer’s Bluetooth software configuration program but without using the Microsoft Bluetooth transceiver.
gloss: To bring two (animals, notably dogs) together for mating.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
gloss: To come together for mating.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: The raven, in short, when he pairs, which he does at the earliest moment permitted by the laws of ravendom, pairs for life […]
gloss: To engage (oneself) with another of opposite opinions not to vote on a particular question or class of questions.
pos: verb
tags: slang
gloss: To suit; to fit, as a counterpart.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: My Heart was made to fit and pair with thine, / Simple and plain, and fraught with artleſs Tenderneſs; / Form’d to receive one Love, and only one, / But pleas’d and proud, and dearly fond of that, / It knows not what there can be in Variety, / And would not if it could.
Synonyms: duo
dyad
couple
brace
twosome
duplet
Related words: parity
couple
Derived words: acid-base pair
alpha pair
another pair of shoes
aspectual pair
base pair
base-pair breathing
bottom pair
Breit-Wheeler pair production
byte pair encoding
carriage and pair
Church pair
conjugate acid-base pair
conjugate redox pair
contrapair
Cooper pair
coxless pair
Darlington pair
dispair
eigenpair
electron pair
extrapair
extra pair of hands
force pair
fresh pair of eyes
get a pair
golden pair
grow a pair
have a pair
homologous pair
Hoogsteen base pair
inert pair effect
in pairs
interpair
intrapair
inversion pair
kernel pair
keypair
kilobase pair
king pair
Kramers pair
Lax pair
linear pair
live pair
lone pair
megabase pair
middle pair
minimal pair
multipair
near-minimal pair
on a pair
one hair of a woman can draw more than a hundred pair of oxen
one pair
ordered pair
orthopair
overpair
pair and share
pair bond
pair bonding
pairbreaking
pairforming
pair-horse
pair-oar(ed)
pair of binoculars
pair of colors
pair of colours
pair of compasses
pair of eyeglasses
pair of forceps
pair of glasses
pair of goggles
pair of hands
pair of ladders
pair of nutcrackers
pair of pants
pair of pincers
pair of pliers
pair of scissors
pair of secateurs
pair of shades
pair of shears
pair of shoes
pair of specs
pair of stairs
pair of stepladders
pair of sunglasses
pair of tongs
pair of trousers
pair of tweezers
pair of underwear
pair production
pair programmer
pair programming
pair royal
pair skating
pairwise
pairwork
photopair
pigeon pair
pocket pair
post and pair
rarepair
royal pair
safe pair of hands
shielded twisted pair
show a clean pair of heels
slot pair
stereopair
strap on a pair
subpair
surrogate pair
Sziklai pair
think-pair-share
think-pair-sharing
top pair
twin prime pair
twisted pair
underpair
unpair
Translations:
lang: Albanian
word: çift
lang: Northern Altai
word: тӧй
roman: töy
lang: Southern Altai
word: кош
roman: koš
lang: Arabic
word: زَوْج
roman: zawj
lang: Arabic
word: جوز
roman: gōz
lang: Arabic
word: اجواز
roman: egwaz
lang: Arabic
word: جوزين
roman: gōzen
lang: Armenian
word: զույգ
roman: zuyg
lang: Aromanian
word: pãreaclje
lang: Aromanian
word: pãreaclji
lang: Aromanian
word: giugii
lang: Aromanian
word: uidii
lang: Aromanian
word: zivyari
lang: Azerbaijani
word: cüt
lang: Basque
word: biko
lang: Belarusian
word: па́ра
roman: pára
lang: Bengali
word: জোড়া
roman: jōṛa
lang: Bulgarian
word: дво́йка
roman: dvójka
lang: Bulgarian
word: чифт
roman: čift
lang: Burmese
word: ဒွေးဘော်
roman: dwe:bhau
lang: Burmese
word: ယမက
roman: ya.ma.ka.
lang: Burmese
word: အတွဲ
roman: a.twai:
lang: Catalan
word: parella
lang: Catalan
word: parell
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 雙 /双
roman: shuāng
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 對 /对
roman: duì
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 一對 /一对
roman: yīduì
lang: Chinese Cantonese
word: 啤
roman: pe1
lang: Chinese Cantonese
word: 雙 /双
roman: soeng1
lang: Chinese Cantonese
word: 對 /对
roman: deoi3
lang: Czech
word: pár
lang: Danish
word: par
lang: Dutch
word: paar
lang: Dutch
word: koppel
lang: Dutch
word: duo
lang: Dutch
word: tweetal
lang: Dzongkha
word: ཆ
roman: cha
lang: Esperanto
word: paro
lang: Estonian
word: paar
lang: Finnish
word: pari
lang: French
word: paire
lang: Old French
word: couple
lang: Friulian
word: pâr
lang: Galician
word: par
lang: Georgian
word: წყვილი
roman: c̣q̇vili
lang: German
word: Paar
lang: Gothic
word: 𐌲𐌰𐌾𐌿𐌺
roman: gajuk
lang: Greek
word: ζεύγος
roman: zévgos
lang: Greek
word: ζευγάρι
roman: zevgári
lang: Ancient Greek
word: ζεῦγος
roman: zeûgos
lang: Hawaiian
word: paʻa
lang: Hebrew
word: זוּג
roman: zug
lang: Hebrew
word: צֶמֶד
roman: tzémed
lang: Hindi
word: जोड़ा
roman: joṛā
lang: Hungarian
word: pár
lang: Icelandic
word: par
lang: Ingrian
word: pari
lang: Irish
word: péire
lang: Italian
word: paio
lang: Japanese
word: 対
roman: tai
lang: Japanese
word: 一対
roman: ittsui
lang: Japanese
word: 一組
roman: hitokumi
lang: Japanese
word: ペア
roman: pea
lang: Kazakh
word: жұп
roman: jūp
lang: Khakas
word: хос
roman: xos
lang: Khmer
word: គូ
roman: kuu
lang: Korean
word: 한쌍
roman: hanssang
lang: Korean
word: 켤레
roman: kyeolle
lang: Korean
word: 페어
roman: peeo
lang: Kumyk
word: жут
roman: jut
lang: Kumyk
word: чер
roman: çer
lang: Kumyk
word: эки
roman: eki
lang: Central Kurdish
word: جووت
roman: cût
lang: Northern Kurdish
word: cot
lang: Kyrgyz
word: жуп
roman: jup
lang: Kyrgyz
word: кош
roman: koş
lang: Lao
word: ຄູ່
roman: khū
lang: Latin
word: par
lang: Latvian
word: pāris
lang: Lithuanian
word: pora
lang: Luxembourgish
word: Puer
lang: Macedonian
word: пар
roman: par
lang: Macedonian
word: чифт
roman: čift
lang: Mansaka
word: paris
lang: Māori
word: tōpū
lang: Marathi
word: जोडी
roman: joḍī
lang: Middle English
word: paire
lang: Mongolian
word: хос
roman: xos
lang: Moore
word: yɩɩbse
lang: Neapolitan
word: paro
lang: Norman
word: pathe
lang: Norwegian Bokmål
word: par
lang: Occitan
word: parelh
lang: Odia
word: ଜୋଡା
roman: joḍā
lang: Pashto
word: جوړه
roman: ǰoṛá
lang: Pashto
word: زوج
roman: zawǰ
lang: Persian
word: جفت
roman: joft
lang: Persian
word: زوج
roman: zowj
lang: Plautdietsch
word: Poa
lang: Polish
word: para
lang: Portuguese
word: par
lang: Quechua
word: t'inki
lang: Romanian
word: pereche
lang: Romansh
word: pèra
lang: Romansh
word: peera
lang: Russian
word: па́ра
roman: pára
lang: Sanskrit
word: द्वंद्व
roman: dvaṃdva
lang: Sanskrit
word: मिथुन
roman: mithuna
lang: Scottish Gaelic
word: càraid
lang: Scottish Gaelic
word: lànan
lang: Scottish Gaelic
word: paidhir
lang: Serbo-Croatian
word: пар
lang: Serbo-Croatian
word: par
lang: Slovak
word: pár
lang: Slovene
word: par
lang: Spanish
word: par
lang: Swahili
word: jozi
lang: Swedish
word: par
lang: Tajik
word: ҷуфт
roman: juft
lang: Tausug
word: pasang
lang: Thai
word: คู่
roman: kûu
lang: Turkish
word: çift
lang: Ottoman Turkish
word: چفت
roman: çift
lang: Ottoman Turkish
word: زوج
roman: zevc
lang: Turkmen
word: jübüt
lang: Ukrainian
word: па́ра
roman: pára
lang: Urdu
word: جوڑا
roman: joṛā
lang: Uyghur
word: جۈپ
roman: jüp
lang: Uyghur
word: پار
roman: par
lang: Uzbek
word: juft
lang: Uzbek
word: par
lang: Venetan
word: pèr
lang: Vietnamese
word: đôi
lang: Vietnamese
word: cặp
lang: Welsh
word: pâr
lang: Yaghnobi
word: ҷуфт
roman: juft
lang: Yiddish
word: פּאָר
roman: por
lang: Zazaki
word: cıt (diq)