card

plural cards

1. countableuncountableA playing card.

   As each card is played in blackjack, it changes the possibilities for both player and dealer by diminishing the number and the variety of cards that may be dealt.

   1963 January 25, “Games: Beating the Dealer”, in Time

2. countablein pluraluncountableAny game using playing cards; a card game.

   He played cards with his friends.

3. countableuncountableA resource or argument, used to achieve a purpose. (See play the something card.)

   He accused them of playing the race card.

   3 more examples

   The government played the Orange card to get support for their Ireland policy.

   Having adopted civil union as their goal, proponents of the Civil Union Bill were sensitive to the need not to overplay the human rights card, aware that there was a significant degree of resistance in the New Zealand […]

   2007, Luke McNamara, Human Rights Controversies: The Impact of Legal Form, page 138

   Realizing he is now boxed in on all sides, Hipper decides the only remaining card he has to play is to sell his ships as dearly as possible. The remaining German ships make a hard turn southeast, and drive headlong at the Grand Fleet. It is a brave gesture, but only eight of the ships emerge from the pall of smoke that roughly marks the original German line of advance. Two more emerge minutes later, but that is all.

   2018 October 17, Drachinifel, 24:24 from the start, in Last Ride of the High Seas Fleet - Battle of Texel 1918, archived from the original on 04 Aug 2022

4. countableuncountableAny flat, normally rectangular piece of stiff paper, plastic, etc.
5. countableuncountableA bank card.
6. countableuncountableAny electronic payment (rather than a cash payment using notes, bills or coins).

   Cashier: "Cash or card? Customer: "I'm paying on my phone, so card."

7. uncountablePaper that is thicker and more durable than normal writing or printing paper, but thinner and more flexible than paperboard, used for postcards, playing cards, etc.; card stock.

   Do you have any card? I want to make a poster.

8. countableobsoleteuncountableA map or chart.

   As pilot well expert in perilous waue, / Vpon his card and compas firmes his eye […].

   1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, II.vii

9. countableinformaluncountableAn amusing or entertaining person, often slightly eccentric.

   'What a card!' Doreen said. 'Isn't he a card?'

   1963, Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar, Faber and Faber

   2 more examples

   "He's a cheery old card," muttered Harry to Jack / As they slogged up to Arras with rifle and pack. / . . . / But he did for them both by his plan of attack.

   1918, Siegfried Sassoon, The General

   MAREK: But really the deadpan is key. You can essentially trick people into laughing at nothing. EVE: Oh, Marek, you card.

   2007, Meredith Gran, Octopus Pie #71: Deadpan

10. countableuncountableA list of scheduled events or of performers or contestants; chiefly used in professional wrestling.

    What's on the card for tonight?

11. countableuncountableball gamesA tabular presentation of the key statistics of an innings or match: batsmen’s scores and how they were dismissed, extras, total score and bowling figures.
12. countableuncountablecomputingA removable electronic device that may be inserted into a powered electronic device to provide additional capability.

    He needed to replace the card his computer used to connect to the internet.

    Synonyms: expansion card

13. countableuncountablecomputingAny of a set of pages or forms that the user can navigate between, and fill with data, in certain user interfaces.

    The button will "see" the cursor through a card domain graphic; you can then change button graphics on each card.

    1993, Danny Goodman, The Complete HyperCard 2.2 Handbook, page 198

    2 more examples

    The interaction model of WAP, originally developed for mobile phones to interact with information services in a web-like way, was based on Apple's HyperCard, and instead of pages, the user interacted with a deck of cards, which were interlinked by a scripting language.

    2008, Johan Hjelm, Why IPTV?: Interactivity, Technologies, Services, page 13

    The basic building blocks of WML applications are cards. Cards are equivalent to HTML pages. Just as Web browser can show only one page at a time (except when using frames), a WAP enabled device can also show only one card at a time.

    2012, Veljko Milutinovic, Frédéric Patricelli, Mastering E-Business Infrastructure, page 329

14. countableuncountableA greeting card.

    She gave her neighbors a card congratulating them on their new baby.

15. countableuncountableA business card.

    The realtor gave me her card so I could call if I had any questions about buying a house.

16. countableuncountablebroadcastingA title card or intertitle: a piece of filmed, printed text edited into the midst of the photographed action at various points, generally to convey character dialogue or descriptive narrative material related to the plot.
17. countableuncountableA test card.
18. countableuncountableIn formal debating, a verbatim citation used as evidence for a point.

    You can make most theory answers without cards, but some cards do exist which specifically criticize kritiks on a theoretical basis.

    2011, N. Andre Cossette, The Art of Debate: 12th Edition, page 123

19. countabledateduncountableA published note, containing a brief statement, explanation, request, expression of thanks, etc.

    to put a card in the newspapers

20. countabledateduncountableA printed programme.
21. broadlycountabledatedfigurativelyuncountableAn attraction or inducement.

    This will be a good card for the last day of the fair.

22. abbreviationcountableellipsisuncountablenauticalEllipsis of compass card.

    All the quarters that they know / I' the shipman's card.

    c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene iii]

    1 more example

    "The Lord possessed me [= Wisdom] in the beginning of his way, even before his works of old was I set up;" that law, which hath been the pattern to make, and is the card to guide the world by

    1594, Richard Hooker, Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, 1.2.5, page 153 (Everyman edition, vol. 1)

23. countableuncountablebusinessA perforated pasteboard or sheet-metal plate for warp threads, making part of the Jacquard apparatus of a loom.
24. countableuncountablegraph theoryA graph formed from a given graph by deleting one vertex.
25. countableuncountableAn indicator card.
26. PhilippinesabbreviationcountableellipsisuncountableeducationEllipsis of report card.

    Where's your card? I want to see your grades.

27. countableuncountableindustrial relationsA form signed by an employee to agree to representation by a union.

present singular third person cards · participle present carding · participle past carded · past carded

1. UStransitiveTo check IDs, especially against a minimum age requirement.

   They have to card anybody who looks 21 or younger.

   2 more examples

   I heard you don't get carded at the other liquor store.

   Ted (Keanu Reeves): Whoa. He didn't even card us, dude. / Bill (Alex Winter): Yeah, we have to remember this place.

   1989, Chris Matheson, Ed Solomon, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (motion picture)

2. datedTo play cards.

   For Corinius, who gave not a fig for music or dirges, but liked well of carding and dicing, had brought forth his dice box to play with the son of Corund.

   1922, E[ric] R[ücker] Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros: A Romance, London: Jonathan Cape […], →OCLC, page 32

3. transitivegolfTo make (a stated score), as recorded on a scoring card.

   McIlroy carded a stellar nine-under-par 61 in the final round.

plural cards

1. dateduncountableMaterial with embedded short wire bristles.
2. countabledateduncountablebusinessA comb- or brush-like device or tool to raise the nap on a fabric.
3. countableuncountablebusinessA hand-held tool formed similarly to a hairbrush but with bristles of wire or other rigid material. It is used principally with raw cotton, wool, hair, or other natural fibers to prepare these materials for spinning into yarn or thread on a spinning wheel, with a whorl or other hand-held spindle. The card serves to untangle, clean, remove debris from, and lay the fibers straight.
4. countabledateduncountablebusinessA machine for disentangling the fibres of wool prior to spinning.
5. countableuncountableA roll or sliver of fibre (as of wool) delivered from a carding machine.

present singular third person cards · participle present carding · participle past carded · past carded

1. businessTo use a carding device to disentangle the fibres of wool prior to spinning.

   "Isn't that true, Bertha? " asked the smith. "Yes, every word of it, my lad," said Mother Bertha, who was sitting near the hearth carding.

   1886, Peter Christen Asbjø￵rnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 252

2. To scrape or tear someone’s flesh using a metal comb, as a form of torture.
3. transitiveTo comb with a card; to cleanse or disentangle by carding.

   to card a horse

   1 more example

   the carded wool, he says, Is smoothly lapp'd around those cylinders

   1757, John Dyer, The Fleece

4. figurativelyobsoletetransitiveTo clean or clear, as if by using a card.

   It is necessary that this book carded and purged of certain base things.

   1612, Miguel de Cervantes, translated by Thomas Shelton, Don Quixote

5. obsoletetransitiveTo mix or mingle, as with an inferior or weaker article.

   that card your beer, if you see your guests begin to be drunk, half small and half strong

   1592, Robert Greene, A Quip for an Upstart Courtier

plural cards

1. abbreviationAbbreviation of cardinal (“songbird”).

plural cards

1. obsoleteObsolete form of chard.

plural Cards

1. A surname originating as an occupation for a carder of wool.