How do you use the word "lay" in a sentence?

Here are real-life examples of using "lay": The hill lay covered with snow. Fan letters lay in a heap on the desk.

Lay Meaning

/leɪ/

Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.

Definition

verbTo place down in a position of rest, or in a horizontal position.

verbTo cause to subside or abate.

Sentence Examples

The hill lay covered with snow.

Fan letters lay in a heap on the desk.

I lay in my cabin feeling miserably seasick.

Synonyms & Antonyms

Synonyms:

put place position

Antonyms:

sacred professional

CEFR Practice Quiz

The workers will ____ the bricks carefully on the new garden wall.

CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)

You should ____ the map out on the table so that we can clearly see the route that we are going to take.

Word Origin & History

Inherited from Middle English leyen, leggen, from Old English leċġan (“to lay”), from Proto-West Germanic *laggjan, from Proto-Germanic *lagjaną (“to lay”), causative form of Proto-Germanic *ligjaną (“to lie, recline”), from Proto-Indo-European *legʰ- (“to lie, recline”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian lääse (“to lay; to lie”), West Frisian lizze (“to lay, to lie”), Cimbrian leng (“to lay”), Dutch leggen (“to lay”), German legen (“to lay”), Limburgish lègke (“to lay”), Luxembourgish leeën (“to lay”), Yiddish לייגן (leygn, “to lay”), Danish lægge (“to lay”), Faroese, Icelandic leggja (“to lay”), Norwegian Bokmål legge (“to lay”), Norwegian Nynorsk legga, legge, leggja, leggje (“to lay”), Swedish lägga (“to lay”), Gothic 𐌻𐌰𐌲𐌾𐌰𐌽 (lagjan, “to lay”), Old French laier, laiier, laire (“to leave”), Albanian lag (“troop, band, war encampment”).

Literary Quotations & Historical Citations

"A stone was brought, and laid upon the mouth of the den." — 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Daniel 6:17:

"Now I lay me down to sleep, / I pray the Lord my Soul to keep. / If I should die before I ’wake, / I pray the Lord my Soul to take." — 1735, author unknown, The New-England Primer; as reported by Fred R. Shapiro, The Yale Book of Quotations, Yale University Press, 2006, pages 549–550:

"He used to drop into my chambers once in a while to smoke, and was first-rate company. When I gave a dinner there was generally a cover laid for him." — 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, page 2:

"An indulgent playmate, Grannie would lay aside the long scratchy-looking letter she was writing (heavily crossed ‘to save notepaper’) and enter into the delightful pastime of ‘a chicken from Mr Whiteley's’." — 1977, Agatha Christie, chapter 4, in An Autobiography, part I, London: Collins, →ISBN:

"The cloudes, as things affrayd, before him flye; / But all so soone as his outrageous powre / Is layd, they fiercely then begin to shoure […]" — 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, book II, canto viii, verse xlviii:

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