Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A flat piece of coarse fabric or other material used for wiping one's shoes or feet, or in various other forms as a floor covering.
- noun A small flat piece of decorated material placed under a lamp, dish of food, or other object.
- noun Sports A floor pad to protect athletes, as in wrestling or gymnastics.
- noun A densely woven or thickly tangled mass.
- noun The solid part of a lace design.
- noun A heavy woven net of rope or wire cable placed over a blasting site to keep debris from scattering.
- intransitive verb To cover, protect, or decorate with mats or a mat.
- intransitive verb To pack or interweave into a thick mass.
- intransitive verb To be packed or interwoven into a thick mass; become entangled.
- noun A decorative border placed around a picture to serve as a frame or provide contrast between the picture and the frame.
- noun A dull, often rough finish, as of paint, glass, metal, or paper.
- noun A special tool for producing such a surface or finish.
- transitive verb To put a mat around (a picture).
- transitive verb To produce a dull finish on.
from The Century Dictionary.
- An obsolete form of
mate . - To cover or overlay with mats or matting.
- To make like a mat; cause to resemble a mat; twist together; interweave like a mat; entangle: as, matted hair.
- To grow thick together; become interwoven like a mat.
- To produce a rough or unpolished surface on (metal), whether by means of a mat or by engraving with a sharp tool.
- noun In phytogeography, a mat-like aggregation of tufts from basal branches. Compare
mat-plant. Pound and Clements . - Having a dull or dead surface: unpolished; lusterless: as, mat gold; mat silver.
- noun A dull or dead surface, without luster, produced in metals, as gold or silver, by special tools.
- noun [⟨ mat, verb] An implement by which a mat surface is produced, as in gold or silver.
- noun An article plaited or woven of more or less coarse material, as rushes, straw, coir, rope, twine, or thick woolen yarn, of various sizes and shapes according to the use to which it is to be put.
- noun A web of rope-yarn used on ships to secure the standing rigging from the friction of the yards, etc.
- noun Matting; woven rushes or straw.
- noun A structure of interwoven withes, weeds, brush, or the like, or of fascines, fastened with ropes and wires, used as a revetment on river-banks, etc.; a mattress.
- noun A sack made of matting, such as are used to contain coffee or to cover tea-chests; specifically, such a sack containing a certain quantity of coffee.
- noun Anything closely set, dense, and thick: as, a mat of hair; a mat of weeds.
- noun A piece of thick paper, cardboard, or other material placed for protection or ornament immediately under the glass in a picture-frame, with enough of the central part cut out for the proper display of the picture (usually a drawing, engraving, or photograph).
- noun In lace-making, the solid or closely worked surface, as distinguished from the more open part.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun A name given by coppersmiths to an alloy of copper, tin, iron, etc., usually called
white metal . - adjective obsolete Cast down; dejected; overthrown; slain.
- transitive verb To cover or lay with mats.
- transitive verb To twist, twine, or felt together; to interweave into, or like, a mat; to entangle.
- noun A thick flat fabric of sedge, rushes, flags, husks, straw, hemp, or similar material, placed on the floor and used for wiping and cleaning shoes at the door, for covering the floor of a hall or room to protect its surface, and for other purposes.
- noun Any similar flat object made of fabric or other material, such as rubber or plastic, placed flat on a surface for various uses, as for covering plant houses, putting beneath dishes or lamps on a table, securing rigging from friction, and the like.
- noun Anything growing thickly, or closely interwoven, so as to resemble a mat in form or texture
- noun An ornamental border made of paper, pasterboard, metal, etc., put under the glass which covers a framed picture.
- noun (Bot.) Same as
Matweed . - noun (Bot.) a kind of rush (
Scirpus lacustris ) used in England for making mats. - intransitive verb To grow thick together; to become interwoven or felted together like a mat, as hair when wetted with a sticky substance.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A flat piece of
coarse material used forwiping one’s feet, or as a decorative or protectivefloor covering. - noun A small flat piece of material used to protect a
surface from anything hot or rough; acoaster . - noun athletics A floor
pad to protect athletes. - noun A thickly
tangled mess , ofhair etc. - noun A thick
paper orpaperboard border used toinset and center the contents of aframe .
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Actually the article is mainly about whether to use a sticky mat or go commando on the bare floor for all you hygiene enthusiasts, apparently the floor gets cleaned a lot more than your mat*, but anyone who has been to a yoga studio knows that your yoga mat says a lot about who you are and how you live your life.
Charlotte Hilton Andersen: Yoga Mats as Status Symbols: What Does Yours Say About You? Charlotte Hilton Andersen 2010
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Actually the article is mainly about whether to use a sticky mat or go commando on the bare floor (for all you hygiene enthusiasts, apparently the floor gets cleaned a lot more than your mat*), but anyone who has been to a yoga studio knows that your yoga mat says a lot about who you are and how you live your life.
The Full Feed from HuffingtonPost.com Charlotte Hilton Andersen 2010
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Because Adji now has his own place, he no longer eats with any of his older relatives, and because women and men always eat separately (at least in Muslim homes) the dinner "mat" is just Adji and me.
Archive 2005-10-01 Zach Center 2005
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Because Adji now has his own place, he no longer eats with any of his older relatives, and because women and men always eat separately (at least in Muslim homes) the dinner "mat" is just Adji and me.
Madjiri: Homestay Zach Center 2005
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The most common types of sleep positioners have bolsters attached to each side of a thin mat and wedges to elevate the baby's head.
FDA: Sleep positioning devices dangerous for babies Rob Stein 2010
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She brought herself to her knees on the bearskin mat, her face aglow with true Eve-light, and shyly unbuckled his heavy belt.
The Sun of the Wolf 2010
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I have a Monday Knight productions Sea Terrain mat, but one of those by itself without any breaks in line of sight makes for a boring game.
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Slamming you liberals to the mat is easy because I use humor.
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I have a Monday Knight productions Sea Terrain mat, but one of those by itself is a boring game.
Uncharted Seas at Cold Wars 2010 « Third Point of Singularity 2010
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She brought herself to her knees on the bearskin mat, her face aglow with true Eve-light, and shyly unbuckled his heavy belt.
The Son of the Wolf 2010
oroboros commented on the word mat
Tam in reverse.
November 3, 2007
rolig commented on the word mat
Russian for "swearing", from all the crude phrases that refer to doing things to your opponent's mother (mat'). Compare with diamat.
August 26, 2008