Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

velvet

/ˈvɛlvɪt/ noun, verb, adjective

Forms velvets velveting velveted

  1. noun A closely woven fabric (originally of silk, now also of cotton or man-made fibres) with a thick short pile on one side.
  2. noun Very fine fur, including the skin and fur on a deer's antlers.
  3. noun (rare, countable) A female chinchilla; a sow.
  4. noun (slang, uncountable) The drug dextromethorphan.
  5. noun (slang, uncountable) Money acquired by gambling.
  6. verb To cover with velvet or with a covering of a similar texture.
  7. verb (cooking) To coat raw meat in starch, then in oil, preparatory to frying.
  8. verb To remove the velvet from a deer's antlers.
  9. verb (figurative, transitive) To soften; to mitigate.
  10. verb (of a cat's claws) to retract.
  11. adjective Made of velvet.
  12. adjective Soft and delicate, like velvet; velvety.
  13. adjective (politics) Peaceful; carried out without violence; especially as pertaining to the peaceful breakup of Czechoslovakia.

Synonyms

velvety velvet-textured

Etymology

From Middle English velvet, velwet, veluet, from Old Occitan veluet, from Vulgar Latin *villutittus, diminutive of villūtus, from Latin villus (“shaggy hair, tuft of hair”). Cognate with French velours.

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A silk fabric, having a short, close nap of erect threads.
  2. noun The soft and highly vascular deciduous skin which envelops and nourishes the antlers of deer during their rapid growth. Cotton velvet, an imitation of velvet, made of cotton.
  3. adjective Made of velvet; soft and delicate, like velvet; velvety. " The cowslip's velvet head." Milton.
  4. verb To pain velvet. [R.] Peacham.

Etymology [OE. velouette, veluet, velwet; cf. OF. velluau, LL. velluetum, vellutum, It. velluto, Sp. velludo; all fr. (assumed) LL. villutus shaggy, fr L. villus shaggy hair; akin to vellus a fleece, and E. wool. See Wool, and cf. Villous.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “velvet”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details