bag
/bæɡ/ noun, verb
- noun A soft container made out of cloth, paper, thin plastic, etc. and open at the top, used to hold food, commodities, and other goods.
- noun A container made of leather, plastic, or other material, usually with a handle or handles, in which you carry personal items, or clothes or other things that you need for travelling. Includes shopping bags, schoolbags, suitcases, briefcases, handbags, backpacks, etc.
- noun (colloquial) One's preference. “Acid House is not my bag: I prefer the more traditional styles of music.”
- noun (derogatory) An ugly woman.
- noun (baseball) The cloth-covered pillow used for first, second, and third base. “The grounder hit the bag and bounced over the fielder’s head.”
- noun (baseball) First, second, or third base. “He headed back to the bag.”
- noun (preceded by the) A breathalyzer, so named because it formerly had a plastic bag over the end to measure a set amount of breath.
- noun (mathematics) A collection of objects, disregarding order, but (unlike a set) in which elements may be repeated. “A bag of three apples could be represented symbolically as {a,a,a}. Or, letting 'r' denote 'red apple' and 'g' denote 'green apple', then a bag of three red apples and two green apples could be denoted as {r,r,r,g,g}.”
- verb (transitive) To put into a bag.
- verb (informal) To catch or kill, especially when fishing or hunting. “We bagged three deer yesterday.”
- verb To gain possession of something, or to make first claim on something.
- verb (slang) To steal.
- verb (slang, African-American Vernacular) To take a woman away with one as a romantic or sexual interest.
- verb (slang) To arrest.
- verb (transitive) To furnish or load with a bag.
- verb (transitive, medicine) To provide with artificial ventilation via a bag valve mask (BVM) resuscitator.
Synonyms
sack tote poke cup of tea thing affinity bent love cup of coffee cup of joe dish fancy jam liking partiality penchant tilt predilection predisposition preference base handbag pocketbook purse bagful traveling bag travelling bag grip suitcase old bag
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English bagge, from Old Norse baggi (“bag, pack, satchel, bundle”) (whence also Old French bague (“bundle, package, sack”)); related to Old Norse bǫggr (“harm, shame; load, burden”), of uncertain origin.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A sack or pouch, used for holding anything; as, a bag of meal or of money.
- noun A sac, or dependent gland, in animal bodies, containing some fluid or other substance; as, the bag of poison in the mouth of some serpents; the bag of a cow.
- verb To put into a bag; as, to bag hops.
- verb To seize, capture, or entrap; as, to bag an army; to bag game.
Etymology [OE. bagge; cf. Icel. baggi, and also OF. bague, bundle, LL. baga.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “bag”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details