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Webster 1913 Edition


Mater


Ma′ter

,
Noun.
[L., mother. See
Mother
.]

Definition 2024


mater

mater

See also: mâter, mäter, and måter

English

Pronunciation

Noun

mater (plural maters or matres)

  1. (Britain slang, now chiefly archaic or humorous)[1]Mother.
    • 1919, P. G. Wodehouse, ‎A Damsel in Distress‎, page 100:
      Their maters are all pals of my mater, and I don’t want to get them into trouble for aiding and abetting my little show, if you understand what I mean.
    • 1997, Colleen McCullough, Caesar’s Women‎, page 17:
      Mater, you look well.” / “I am well. And you,” she said in that dryly prosaic deep voice of hers, “look healed.”

Etymology 2

mate + -er [2]

Pronunciation

Noun

mater (plural maters)

  1. (biology)[2] Someone or something that mates.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 mater, n.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary (draft revision; March 2009)
  2. 1 2 3 4 mater, n.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary (draft entry; March 2001)

Anagrams


French

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ma.te/

Verb

mater

  1. to get the better of
  2. to checkmate
  3. (slang) to ogle, to check out, to watch (e.g. an attractive person)

Conjugation

Anagrams


Latin

Etymology

From Proto-Italic *mātēr, from Proto-Indo-European *méh₂tēr. Cognates include Proto-Slavic *mati (thence Russian мать (matʹ)), Persian مادر (mâdar), Mycenaean Greek 𐀔𐀳𐀩 (ma-te-re), and Sanskrit मातृ (mātṛ).

Pronunciation

Noun

māter f (genitive mātris); third declension

  1. mother (female parent)
  2. mother (source, origin)
  3. matron of a house
  4. honorific title
  5. woman
  6. nurse
  7. motherland

Inflection

Third declension.

Case Singular Plural
nominative māter mātrēs
genitive mātris mātrum
dative mātrī mātribus
accusative mātrem mātrēs
ablative mātre mātribus
vocative māter mātrēs

Derived terms

Related terms

Descendants

See also

References

  • mater in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • mater in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • Meissner, Carl; Auden, Henry William (1894) Latin Phrase-Book, London: Macmillan and Co.
    • son of such and such a father, mother: patre, (e) matre natus

Norwegian Bokmål

Verb

mater

  1. present tense of mate

Serbo-Croatian

Noun

mater

  1. accusative singular form of mati

Anagrams


Slovak

Etymology

From Proto-Slavic *mati; cognate with Latin māter and Sanskrit मातृ (mātṛ).

Noun

mater f (genitive singular matere, nominative plural matere, declension pattern of dlaň)

  1. mother

Declension

Derived terms