Pay Meaning
/peɪ/Definition, CEFR level A1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
verbTo give money or other compensation to in exchange for goods or services.
verbTo deposit into an account.
Sentence Examples
Life begins when you pay taxes.
Can I pay by credit card?
I earn just about enough to pay the rent.
CEFR Practice Quiz
After you complete the work, the company will ____ you for your time.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The company agreed to ____ all employees a bonus at the end of the financial year.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English payen, from Old French paiier (“pay”), from Medieval Latin pācāre (“to settle, satisfy”) from Latin pācāre (“to pacify”). In this sense, displaced native Old English ġield (“pay”) and ġieldan (“to pay”), whence Modern English yield.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"This time was most dreadful for Lilian. Thrown on her own resources and almost penniless, she maintained herself and paid the rent of a wretched room near the hospital by working as a charwoman, sempstress, anything."
— 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
"Admiral Hackett: You can pay a soldier to fire a gun. You can pay him to charge the enemy. But you can't pay him to believe."
— 2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3, Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Normandy SR-2:
"The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about[…]and so on. But the real way to build a successful online business is to be better than your rivals at undermining people's control of their own attention. Partly, this is a result of how online advertising has traditionally worked: advertisers pay for clicks, and a click is a click, however it's obtained."
— 2013 June 21, Oliver Burkeman, “The tao of tech”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 2, page 48:
"The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again."
— 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 37:21:
"The petty ſtreames that paie a dailie det / To their ſalt ſoveraigne with their freſh fals haſt, / Adde to his flowe, but alter not his taſt."
— 1594, William Shakespeare, Lucrece (First Quarto), London: […] Richard Field, for Iohn Harrison, […], →OCLC:
Explore More A1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
After you complete the work, the company will ____ you for your time.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The company agreed to ____ all employees a bonus at the end of the financial year.