English Explanatory Dictionary

bow

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. A weapon made of a curved piece of wood or other flexible material whose ends are connected by a string, used for shooting arrows.
  2. A curved bend in a rod or planar surface, or in a linear formation such as a river (see oxbow).
  3. A rod with horsehair (or an artificial substitute) stretched between the ends, used for playing various stringed musical instruments.
  4. A stringed instrument (chordophone), consisting of a stick with a single taut cord stretched between the ends, most often played by plucking.
  5. A type of knot with two loops, used to tie together two cords such as shoelaces or apron strings, and frequently used as decoration, such as in gift-wrapping.
  6. Anything bent or curved, such as a rainbow.
  7. The U-shaped piece which goes around the neck of an ox and fastens it to the yoke.
  8. Either of the arms of a pair of spectacles, running from the side of the lens to behind the wearer's ear.
  9. Any instrument consisting of an elastic rod, with ends connected by a string, employed for giving reciprocating motion to a drill, or for preparing and arranging hair, fur, etc., used by hatters.
  10. A crude sort of quadrant formerly used for taking the sun's altitude at sea.
  11. Two pieces of wood which form the arched forward part of a saddle tree.
  12. The part of a key that is not inserted into the lock and that is used to turn the key.
verb
  1. To play music on (a stringed) instrument using a bow.
  2. To bend or curve, particularly downward.
  3. To exercise powerful or controlling influence over; to bend or incline, figuratively; to humble or subdue.
verb
  1. To bend oneself as a gesture of respect or deference.
  2. To debut.
  3. To defer (to something).
  4. To give a direction, indication, or command to by bowing.
noun
  1. A gesture, usually showing respect, made by inclining the head or bending forward at the waist; a reverence
noun
  1. The front of a boat or ship.
  2. The rower that sits in the seat closest to the bow of the boat.
noun
  1. Obsolete spelling of bough.
noun
  1. Alternative form of bao; any of several Chinese buns and breads
verb
  1. about to
intj
  1. Ellipsis of bow-wow
noun
  1. Ellipsis of bow-wow
verb
  1. Ellipsis of bow-wow
name
  1. A surname.
  2. A place name:
  3. A place in the United Kingdom
  4. A suburb of eastern London in the borough of Tower Hamlets, Greater London, England (OS grid ref TQ3782).
  5. A village and civil parish in Mid Devon district, Devon, England (OS grid ref SS7201).
  6. A hamlet in Ashprington parish, South Hams district, Devon (OS grid ref SX8156).
  7. A hamlet in Stanford in the Vale parish, Vale of White Horse district, Oxfordshire, England (OS grid ref SU3494).
  8. A place in the United States
  9. An unincorporated community in Cumberland County, Kentucky.
  10. A town in Merrimack County, New Hampshire.
  11. An unincorporated commmunity in Skagit County, Washington.
  12. Ellipsis of Bow Creek
noun
  1. Initialism of bag of words.
noun
  1. Alternative letter-case form of BOW.

Pronunciation

/ˈbəʊ̯/ /ˈbɵʊ̯/ En-uk-bow-1.ogg /ˈboʊ̯/ /ˈbɔʊ̯/ En-us-bow-1.ogg /ˈbəʉ̯/ /ˈbɐ̝ʉ̯/ bou /baʊ/ En-uk-bow-2.ogg En-us-bow-2.ogg /bəʊ/ LL-Q1860 (eng)-Rho9998-Bow.wav

Word forms

bow bows bowing bowed bao bau

Etymology

From Middle English bowe, from Old English boga, Proto-West Germanic *bogō, from Proto-Germanic *bugô. Cognates Cognate with Saterland Frisian Booge (“arch, bow, curve”), West Frisian bôge (“arc, arch, bow”), Dutch boog (“arc, arch, bow”), German Bogen (“arc, arch, bow, curve”), Luxembourgish Bou (“arc, arch, bow, curve”), Vilamovian böga (“arc, arch, bend, bow, curve”), Yiddish בויגן (boygn, “arc, arch, bow, curve”), Danish bue (“arc, arch, bow, curve”), Faroese, Icelandic bogi (“arch, bow, vault”), Jamtish buga (“bow”), Norwegian Bokmål bue (“arc, arch, bow”), Norwegian Nynorsk boge (“arc, arch, bow”), Swedish båge (“bow”), Crimean Gothic boga (“bow”).

Synonyms

fiddlestick musical bow arc bend curve stem forestem fore prow prore

Antonyms

stern aft poop

Related words

buxom elbow bow chicka wow wow bow diddley diddley bow coll'arco curtsey kowtow throw them bows Bowe Bowes

Derived words

another string to one's bow barebow bow and arrow bowbearer bowbent bow bug bow collector bow compass bow drill bow-faced bowfin bow frame bowfront bow-fronted bow grip bow guard bowguard bow harp bowhead bowhunt bowhunter bowhunting bowhuntress Bow Island bow kite bowknot bowleg bow-legged bowless bowlike bow maker bowmaking bowmanship bowmaster bow net bow pen bow pencil Bow River bow saw bowshot bow spring bowstave Bow Street bowstring bowstringer bow stroke bow tie bowtie bow window bowwoman bow-wood bowyer Brocken bow Broken Bow brush bow cloud bow Cupid's bow dickie bow dicky bow diddley bow

Translations

Afrikaans: strykstok Arabic: قَوْس Arabic: عصاية Asturian: arcu Belarusian: смычо́к Belarusian: смык Breton: gwareg Bulgarian: лък Catalan: arc Chinese Mandarin: 弦樂器的弓 /弦乐器的弓 Chinese Mandarin: 琴弓 Czech: smyčec Danish: bue Dutch: strijkstok Esperanto: arĉo Finnish: jousi French: archet West-Frisian: strykstôk German: Bogen Bavarian German: Bogn Greek: δοξάρι Greenlandic: tagiut Hebrew: קֶשֶׁת Hungarian: vonó Icelandic: bogi Ido: arketo Irish: bogha Italian: arco Italian: archetto Japanese: 弓 Kazakh: қияқ Kazakh: ысқы Khmer: ឆាក Korean: 활 Kyrgyz: смычок Latvian: lociņš Lithuanian: smičius Lithuanian: strykas Macedonian: гудало Manx: bow Māori: kōpere Māori: whana Norman: artchet Norwegian Bokmål: bue Norwegian Nynorsk: boge Ojibwe: naazhaabike'iganaak Persian: آرشِه
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
Back to search All on B Russian dictionary Dahl dictionary