butt
Forms
- Plural
- butts
- present (v1)
- butt
- past (v2)
- butted
- past participle (v3)
- butted
- present participle
- butting
- 3rd person singular
- butts
Definitions
1.The larger or thicker end of something; the blunt end, in distinction from the sharp or narrow end.
- Get up off your butt and get to work.
- We can't chat today. I have to get my butt to work before I'm late.
- Get your butt to the car.
2.The waste end of anything.
- I walked around, picking butts from the street.
3.An end of something, often distinguished in some way from the other end.
- She was hit in the face with the butt of a shotgun.
- I put out my hand and felt the meat-chopper hanging to the wall. In a flash I was after him. [...] With one last touch of humanity I turned the blade back and struck him with the butt.
4.A limit; a bound; a goal; the extreme bound; the end.
- He's usually the butt of their jokes.
- I played a sentence or two at my butt, which I thought very smart.
- Here is my journey's end, here is my butt / And very sea-mark of my utmost sail.
1.To strike bluntly, particularly with the head.
- Two harmless lambs are butting one the other.
2.To strike bluntly with the head.
- Rams butt at other males during mating season.
3.To cut in line (in front of someone).
- Teacher! He just butted me!
4.To join at the butt, end, or outward extremity; to terminate; to be bounded; to abut.
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #3887
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Uncommon
- General reading & writing
- Uncommon
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Related words
Etymology
From Middle English but, butte (“goal, mark, butt of land”), from Old English byt, bytt (“small piece of land”) and *butt (attested in diminutive Old English buttuc (“end, small piece of land”) > English buttock), from Proto-West Germanic *butt, from Proto-Germanic *buttaz (“end, piece”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰudʰnós (“bottom”), later thematic variant of Proto-Indo-European *bʰudʰmḗn ~ *bʰudʰn-, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *dʰewbʰ- (“deep”).