line

CEFRA1

/laɪn/

noun · verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    A long narrow mark or arrangement of people or things.

  2. 02

    noun

    A row of people waiting for something.

Examples

  • Butter and line a 25 cm cake tin.

  • Since you like to write letters, why don't you drop her a line?

At a glance

Sits at A1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Also pronounced

  • [lɑe̯n]
  • /lɑɪn/

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A path through two or more points (compare ‘segment’); a continuous mark, including as made by a pen; any path, curved or straight.

  2. An infinitely extending one-dimensional figure that has no curvature; one that has length but not breadth or thickness.

verb

Extra meaning

  1. To cover the inside of something with a material.

More examples

In context

  • You're giving me the same old line.

  • The arrow descended in a curved line.

  • the main water line to the house

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

To create the border, she used a ruler to draw a straight blank across the page.

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

Nearby

Origin

noun

From Middle English line, lyne, from Old English līne (“line, cable, rope, hawser, series, row, rule, direction”), from Proto-West Germanic *līnā, from Proto-Germanic *līnǭ (“line, rope, flaxen cord, thread”), from Proto-Germanic *līną (“flax, linen”), from Proto-Indo-European *līno- (“flax”). Influenced in Middle English by Middle French ligne (“line”), from Latin linea. More at linen. The oldest sense of the word is “rope, cord, thread”; from this the senses “path”, “continuous mark” were derived.