ham

CEFRA2

/ˈhæm/

noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    Meat from the upper part of a pig's leg.

  2. 02

    noun

    An actor who performs in an exaggerated way.

Examples

  • Some children brought peanut butter sandwiches, some ham, and others cheese.

  • Would you slice me a piece of ham, please?

At a glance

Sits at A2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
3
Synonyms
5

Also pronounced

  • [ˈhæm] ~ [ˈham]
  • [ˈham] ~ [ˈhäm]

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A thigh and/or buttock of a hog slaughtered for meat; (occasionally) the corresponding cut from some other animal.

  2. Meat from the thigh and/or buttock of a hog cured for food.

  3. The region back of the knee joint; the popliteal space; the hock.

More examples

In context

  • a little piece of ham for the cat

  • Near-synonym: camp it up

  • "I'll have you so your hams will stand out like horse's shanks!" de declared.

Synonyms

Antonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

For breakfast, he ate a slice of blank from the pig's leg.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

Inherited from Middle English hamme, from Old English hamm (“inner or hind part of the knee, ham”), from Proto-West Germanic *hammu, from Proto-Germanic *hamō, *hammō, *hanmō, from Proto-Indo-European *kónh₂m (“leg”). Cognate with Dutch ham (“ham”), dialectal German Hamme (“hind part of the knee, ham”), dialectal Swedish ham (“the hind part of the knee”), Icelandic höm (“the ham or haunch of a horse”), Old Irish cnáim (“bone”), Ancient Greek κνήμη (knḗmē, “shinbone”). Compare gammon and gam.