cribbage

C3R1I1B3B3A1G2E1
/ˈkɹɪbɪd͡ʒ/

noun

A point-counting card game for two players, with variants for three or four players; the cribbage board used for scoring to 61 or 121 points in numerous small increments is characteristic.

Similar
Less commonScrabble 15

Meanings

nouncribbage (countable and uncountable, plural cribbages)

plural cribbages

  1. countableuncountablecard gamesA point-counting card game for two players, with variants for three or four players; the cribbage board used for scoring to 61 or 121 points in numerous small increments is characteristic.

    "No one remembers cribbage now," […]

    1919, Ronald Firbank, Valmouth, Duckworth, hardback edition, page 31
    2 more examples

    His solicitude for Sir Horace, his brother-in-law, was extreme, and he passed hours in the sick youth’s chamber, playing at cribbage, or dominos, or indulging the young baronet’s remarkable turn for cutting out trees, animals, or birds with tiny scissors on delicate paper.

    1842, [Katherine] Thomson, chapter V, in Widows and Widowers. A Romance of Real Life., volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 105

    How much more real this dream was than that they should go back to the house where the sleeping children lay and where Stanley and Beryl played cribbage.

    1918, Katherine Mansfield, Prelude, Selected Stories, Oxford World's Classics paperback 2002, page 114
  2. countableuncountableA variety of pocket billiards that, like the card game, awards points for pairs that total 15. A player who pockets a ball of a particular number must then immediately pocket the companion ball that brings the number to 15.
  3. countableuncountableA point scored in this variety of pocket billiards.

Synonyms & antonyms

Similar

nouna card game (usually for two players) in which each player is dealt six cards and discards one or two

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Also see

Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.

Origin

From crib + -age. Named from the "crib" consisting of certain cards laid aside by each player.

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

Bulgarian крибидж
  • крибидж (kribidž)card game
Esperanto kribaĝo
  • kribaĝocard game
French crib
  • cribcard game
Polish cribbage
  • cribbagecard game
Russian кри́ббедж, кри́бедж
  • кри́ббедж (kríbbɛdž)card game
  • кри́бедж (kríbɛdž)card game
  • кри́ббидж (kríbbidž)card game
  • кри́бидж (kríbidž)card game
Cite this entry
APA

cribbage. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cribbage

MLA

“cribbage.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cribbage. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “cribbage,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cribbage.

Source: cribbage on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.