bay

• enPR: bā, IPA^(key): /beɪ/

• Audio (US)

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• Rhymes: -eɪ
• Homophone: bae

From Middle English baye, baie, from Old English beġ (“berry”), as in beġbēam (“berry-tree”), conflated with Old French baie, from Latin bāca (“berry”).

bay (plural bays)

1. (obsolete) A berry.
2. Laurus nobilis, a tree or shrub of the family Lauraceae, having dark green leaves and berries.
3. Bay leaf, the leaf of this or certain other species of tree or shrub, used as a herb.
4. (in the plural, now rare) The leaves of this shrub, woven into a garland used to reward a champion or victor; hence, fame, victory.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     both you here with many a cursed oth, / Sweare she is yours, and stirre vp bloudie frayes, / To win a willow bough, whilest other weares the bayes.

   • 1771, John Trumbull, On the Vanity of Youthful Expectations:

     The patriot's honours and the poet's bays.

5. (US, dialect) A tract covered with bay trees.
6. A kind of mahogany obtained from Campeche in Mexico.

• (Laurus nobilis): bay laurel, Grecian laurel, laurel, sweet bay, true laurel, bay tree
• (Garland symbolic of fame, victor): laurels

From French baie, from Late Latin baia, probably ultimately from Iberian or Basque badia. Displaced native Old English byht.

bay (plural bays)

1. (geography) A body of water (especially the sea) more-or-less three-quarters surrounded by land.
   • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:

     'Twas early June, the new grass was flourishing everywheres, the posies in the yard—peonies and such—in full bloom, the sun was shining, and the water of the bay was blue, with light green streaks where the shoal showed.

2. A bank or dam to keep back water.

• (body of water): gulf

From Middle English, from Old French baee, beee, from the verb beer (“gape open”), from Early Medieval Latin batāre. Compare Modern French baie. More at bevel, badinage.

bay (plural bays)

1. An opening in a wall, especially between two columns.
2. An internal recess; a compartment or area surrounded on three sides.
   • 2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Normandy SR-2:

     Wrex: And Shepard--I like what you've done with the Normandy. Got tired of always hanging around the cargo bay before.

   • 2013 June 1, “Ideas coming down the track”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, page 13 (Technology Quarterly):

     A “moving platform” scheme […] is more technologically ambitious than maglev trains even though it relies on conventional rails. Local trains would use side-by-side rails to roll alongside intercity trains and allow passengers to switch trains by stepping through docking bays.

3. The distance between two supports in a vault or building with a pitched roof.
4. (nautical) Each of the spaces, port and starboard, between decks, forward of the bitts, in sailing warships.
5. (rail transport) A bay platform.
   • 1946 May and June, G. A. Sekon, “L.B.S.C.R. West Coast Section—3”, in Railway Magazine, page 149:

     There is a short bay at the west end of each platform, but neither is used for passenger trains.

6. A bay window.

From Old French bay, combined with aphetized form of abay; verbal form of baier, abaier.

bay (plural bays)

1. The excited howling of dogs when hunting or being attacked.
   • c. 1588–1593, William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus, act 2, scene 2, lines 1–6:

     The hunt is up, the morn is bright and grey, / The fields are fragrant, and the woods are green. / Uncouple here, and let us make a bay / And wake the Emperor and his lovely bride, / And rouse the Prince, and ring a hunter's peal, / That all the court may echo with the noise.

2. (by extension) The climactic confrontation between hunting-dogs and their prey.
3. (figuratively) A state of being obliged to face an antagonist or a difficulty, when escape has become impossible.
   • 1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

     Embolden'd by despair, he stood at bay.

   • 1832, [Isaac Taylor], Saturday Evening. […], London: Holdsworth and Ball, →OCLC:

     The most terrible evils are just kept at bay by incessant efforts.

• at bay

bay (third-person singular simple present bays, present participle baying, simple past and past participle bayed)

1. (intransitive) To howl.
   • 1700, [John] Dryden, “Theodore and Honoria, from Boccace”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

     The hounds at nearer distance hoarsely bay'd.

   • 1905, Lord Dunsany [i.e., Edward Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany], The Gods of Pegāna, London: [Charles] Elkin Mathews, […], →OCLC, page 92:

     For at the last shall the thunder, fleeing to escape from the doom of the gods, roar horribly among the Worlds; and Time, the hound of the gods, shall bay hungrily at his masters because he is lean with age.

   • 1962, “Monster Mash”, Bobby "Boris" Pickett and Lenny Capizzi (lyrics), performed by Bobby (Boris) Pickett and The Crypt-Kickers:

     The scene was rocking, all were digging the sounds
     Igor on chains, backed by his baying hounds
     The coffin-bangers were about to arrive
     With their vocal group, The Crypt-Kicker Five.

2. (transitive) To bark at; hence, to follow with barking; to bring or drive to bay.

   to bay the bear

   • a. 1611, William Shakespeare, Cymbeline, act 5, scene 5, lines 222–223:

     Spit, and throw stones, cast mire upon me, set / The dogs o'th' street to bay me

3. (transitive) To pursue noisily, like a pack of hounds.

From Middle English bay, bai, from Old French bai, from Latin badius (“reddish brown, chestnut”).

bay (comparative bayer or more bay, superlative bayest or most bay)

1. (especially of horses) Of a reddish-brown colour.
   • 2003 January 8, Stuart Lavietes, “F. William Free, 74, Ad Man Behind 'Fly Me'”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     Mr. Free also owned restaurants and bred horses. His bay gelding, Packett's Landing, won almost $800,000 in his five-year career in the late 1980's and early 1990's.

bay (countable and uncountable, plural bays)

1.  A brown colour/color of the coat of some horses.

   bay:  

2. A horse of this color.
   • 1877, George Nevile, Horses and Riding, page 105:

     […] browns are the soberest, bays are the worst tempered, and chestnuts are the most foolish.

• For quotations using this term, see Citations:bay.

• bay antler
• bay-beh
• abeyance
• badinage
• baize
• daphne
• voe
• Wikipedia article on bays in geography
• Appendix:Colors
• Wikipedia article on bay, the horse colour/color

• Aby, YBA, aby

bay

1. (Mpakwithi) barracouta

• Terry Crowley, The Mpakwithi dialect of Anguthimri (1981), page 185

• IPA^(key): /ˈbaj/, [ˈbaɪ̯]

Aphetic form of abay.

bay (Badlit spelling ᜊᜌ᜔)

1. Term of address to a male friend

bay (Badlit spelling ᜊᜌ᜔)

1. (Metro Cebu, Bohol, Leyte) Contraction of balay

• IPA^(key): /bæi/

bay m (plural bayow)

1. kiss

• amm, abm
• cussyn

• amma, abma

bay

1. rich

From French bailler.

bay

1. to give

From Saint Dominican Creole French baye, from French bailler.

• IPA^(key): /baj/

bay

1. to give

   Synonyms: ba, ban

bay

1. dog

• Anne Storch, Hone, in Coding Participant Marking: Construction Types in Twelve African Languages, edited by Gerrit Jan Dimmendaal

bay

1. buttock

• 1992, Rose Whitehurst, Noongar Dictionary, Noongar Language and Culture Centre (Bunbury, Western Australia)

Borrowed from Spanish paño.

bay

1. rebozo

• López Antonio, Joaquín, Jones, Ted, Jones, Kris (2012) Vocabulario breve del Zapoteco de San Juan Guelavía‎ (in Spanish), second electronic edition, Tlalpan, D.F.: Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, A.C., pages 13, 28

Borrowed from English bye.

bay

1. bye; so long

From Proto-Bisayan *balay, from Proto-Central Philippine *balay, from Proto-Philippine *balay, from Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *balay, from Proto-Austronesian *balay. Cognate of Cebuano balay and Tausug bāy.

bay

1. house; home

• bayay (Surigaonon)

bay

1. rich, noble

From Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *balay.

bāy

1. house

From Ottoman Turkish بای (bay, “rich”), from Proto-Turkic *bāy (“rich, noble; many, numerous”).

The meaning “sir, gentleman” was coined during the language reforms to replace bey.[1]

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɑj/

bay (definite accusative bayı, plural baylar)

1. (countable) gentleman
2. (title used for a man) Mr.

Used as a title, the word is usually capitalized and followed by a male person's name, often his surname or full name (as in “Bay Ahmet Şık”). This is unlike the more traditional title bey, which is used after a person's name, most commonly just his given name (as in “Ahmet Bey”).

• bey
• beyefendi

• albay
• yarbay
• bayan

bay

1. (dialectal, otherwise dated) rich, wealthy

• zengin (rich)
• varlıklı (rich)

• yoksul (poor)
• fakir (poor)
• züğürt (poor)

• bayındır

• (Hà Nội) IPA^(key): [ʔɓaj˧˧]
• (Huế) IPA^(key): [ʔɓaj˧˧]
• (Hồ Chí Minh City) IPA^(key): [ʔɓa(ː)j˧˧]

• Audio (Hà Nội)

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• Audio (Ho Chi Minh City)

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From Proto-Vietic *pər, from Proto-Mon-Khmer *par; cognates include Muong păl, Bahnar păr, Pacoh pár and Mon ပဝ် (pɔ).

bay • (飛, 𠖤, 𩙻)

1. to fly (travel through the air)
2. to flutter (flap or wave quickly but irregularly)
3. to fly (travel very fast)
4. to fade away
5. to lose

   bay 3 triệu ― lose 3 million dong

bay

1. with ease; in a fast-paced manner

   cãi bay ― to bluntly deny

(classifier cái) bay • (𨭍)

1. trowel

See bây.

• bây

bay

1. (informal) you (second-person plural)

• mày

• "bay" in Hồ Ngọc Đức, Free Vietnamese Dictionary Project (details)

Borrowed from Spanish paño (“cloth”), from Latin pannus.

bay

1. handkerchief
2. scarf

• bay choꞌa ḻeꞌe
• güex̱oa bay

• Long C., Rebecca, Cruz M., Sofronio (2000) Diccionario zapoteco de San Bartolomé Zoogocho, Oaxaca (Serie de vocabularios y diccionarios indígenas “Mariano Silva y Aceves”; 38)‎ (in Spanish), second electronic edition, Coyoacán, D.F.: Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, A.C., page 5