mat
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Appendix:Variations of "mat"
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Ainu • Albanian • Atong (India) • Breton • Catalan • Czech • Danish • Dutch • Emilian • Faroese • French • Garo • Gothic • Icelandic • Luxembourgish • Malay • Maricopa • Marshallese • Middle English • Northern Sami • Norwegian Bokmål • Norwegian Nynorsk • Old French • Old Irish • Paipai • Polish • Romanian • Romansch • Semai • Slavomolisano • Slovak • South Efate • Spanish • Swedish • Tok Pisin • Volapük
Page categories
Symbol
mat
See also
Pronunciation
Etymology 1
Inherited from Middle English matte, from Old English meatte, from Late Latin matta, from Punic or Phoenician (compare Hebrew מיטה \ מִטָּה (mitá, “bed, couch”)).
Noun
mat (plural mats)
- A flat piece of coarse material used for wiping one’s feet, or as a decorative or protective floor covering.
- Wipe your feet on the mat before coming in.
- A small flat piece of material used to protect a surface from anything hot or rough; a coaster.
- They put mats on the table during mealtimes.
- (athletics) A floor pad to protect athletes.
- The high jumper cleared the bar and landed safely on the mat.
- A thickly tangled mess.
- a mat of weeds
- 1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Grove Press, published 1959, →OCLC:
- But to return to where we left her, I see her still, propped up in a kind of stupor against one of the walls in which this wretched edifice abounds, her long grey greasy hair framing in its cowl of scrofulous mats a face where pallor, languor, hunger, acne, recent dirt, immemorial chagrin and surplus hair seemed to dispute the mastery.
- A thin layer of woven, non-woven, or knitted fiber that serves as reinforcement to a material.
- A thin surface layer; superficial cover.
- Iceland moss growing in a mat
- 2016 November 15, Donald R. Prothero, The Princeton Field Guide to Prehistoric Mammals, page 222:
- The fad for blaming all mass extinctions (such as happened at the end of the Cretaceous when the dinosaurs vanished) on impacts of objects from space was extended to the Pleistocene in 2007. That year a group of scientists proposed that the North American extinctions were due to a comet or meteorite impact over the Carolinas, near the beginning of the Younger Dryas event, about 12,900 years ago. The original evidence for this supposed impact was a "black mat" of organic material in many Clovis sites, plus microscopic nano-diamonds in deep-sea cores, and rare Platinum group metals in Greenland ice cores from around 12,900 years ago.
Derived terms
- algal mat
- baking mat
- bath mat
- beer mat
- camping mat
- chair mat
- collision mat
- crashmat
- dance mat
- doormat
- floor mat
- floormat
- gauze mat
- go to the mat
- mat amaranth
- mat daisy
- matless
- mat slab
- mouse mat
- paunch mat
- place mat
- prayer mat
- roll mat
- sea mat
- sleeping mat
- splat mat
- surf mat
- sword mat
- tablemat
- tumbling mat
- welcome mat
- yoga mat
- Zanzibar mat
Descendants
Translations
foot wiping device or floor covering
|
protector
|
athletics: protective pad
thickly tangled mess
thin layer of fiber as reinforcement
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Verb
mat (third-person singular simple present mats, present participle matting, simple past and past participle matted)
- (transitive) To cover, protect or decorate with mats.
- 1664, J[ohn] E[velyn], “Kalendarium Hortense: Or, The Gard’ners Almanac; […] ”, in Sylva, or A Discourse of Forest-trees and the Propagation of Timber in His Majesties Dominions. […], London: […] Jo[hn] Martyn, and Ja[mes] Allestry, printers to the Royal Society, […], →OCLC:
- Be careful now to keep the Doors and Windows of your Conservatories well matted
- (intransitive) To form a thick, tangled mess; to interweave into, or like, a mat; to entangle.
- 1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite: Or, The Knight’s Tale. In Three Books.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
- And o'er his eyebrows hung his matted hair.
Translations
cover, protect, decorate with mats
|
Etymology 2
Noun
mat (plural mats)
- (video games, slang, chiefly Fortnite, in the plural) Clipping of material.
- I used up all my mats cranking 90s and ended up getting one-pumped.
- 2019 October 24, Christopher Groux, “'Fortnite' Weapon Upgrade Guide - Upgrade Bench Locations & More”, in Newsweek, New York, N.Y.: Newsweek Publishing LLC, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-03-30:
- Using a Weapon Upgrade Bench, it's possible to upgrade a Common Shotgun, for example, all the way to Legendary provided you've harvested enough mats to do so.
- [2020 November 28, Gökhan Çakır, “Common Fortnite terms and their meanings”, in Dot Esports, archived from the original on 2023-05-21:
- While there are game modes where you can build without any requirements, you'll need to harvest materials to build in normal Fortnite games. Mats is the shortened version of materials.]
- 2021 September 25, Alan Bernal, “Viral Fortnite TikTok trick shows how to use Armored Walls for easy kills”, in Dexerto, archived from the original on 2021-10-26:
- Fortnite added a new trap with the Armored Wall reinforcement for mats and one viral TikTok showed just how deadly the new item can be in a close fight.
- 2022 July 16, Sarthak Chauhan, “Fortnite YouTuber using 1000 mats in less than 30 seconds shows exactly what not to do”, in Sportskeeda, archived from the original on 2023-05-29:
- The looper goes on laying more than a thousand mats in thirty seconds. He finally reaches his opponent, who is easily brought down with a shell of a shotgun and a burst of an SMG. Upon eliminating the opponent, he is ecstatic in celebration.
Related terms
Etymology 3
Compare matte.
Alternative forms
Noun
mat
- (coppersmithing) An alloy of copper, tin, iron, etc.; white metal.
Etymology 4
A clipped form of matinee.
Noun
mat (plural mats)
- (dated slang) Abbreviation of matinee (“performance at a theater”).
- 1898, The Hotel/Motor Hotel Monthly, volume 6, page 27:
Etymology 5
Noun
mat (plural mats)
- Alternative spelling of matte (“decorative border around a picture”)
- the mat of a daguerreotype
Adjective
mat
- Alternative form of matte (“not reflecting light”)
- 2013, K. A. Spencer, Agromyzidae (Diptera) of Economic Importance, page 264:
- Frons mat black, orbits slightly paler, more greyish; mesonotum distinctly mat, greyish-black, but with some subshine; […]
Etymology 6
Noun
mat (plural mats)
See also
(etymologically unrelated terms containing the word "mat"):
Anagrams
Pronunciation
Noun
mat (Kana spelling マッ)
Verb
mat (Kana spelling マッ)
- take a wife
Synonyms
Antonyms
Derived terms
- matne (“female”)
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