gear

From Middle English gere, a borrowing from Old Norse gervi, from Proto-Germanic *garwijaną (“to prepare”). See also adjective yare, yar from the same root via Old English.

• (UK) enPR: gîr, IPA^(key): /ɡɪə(ɹ)/
• (US) enPR: gîr, IPA^(key): /ɡɪɚ/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪə(ɹ)

gear (countable and uncountable, plural gears)

1. (uncountable) Equipment or paraphernalia, especially that used for an athletic endeavor.
2. Clothing; garments.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 26:

     Aray thy selfe in her most gorgeous geare

   • 2000, “s:(I'm Spending) Hanukkah in Santa Monica”, in Tom Lehrer (music), The Remains of Tom Lehrer, performed by Tom Lehrer:

     Those Eastern winters, ⁠I can't endure 'em / So every year I pack my gear and come out here till Purim / Rosh Hashanah, I spend in Arizona

3. (obsolete) Goods; property; household items.
   • 1551, Thomas More, “(please specify the Internet Archive page)”, in Raphe Robynson [i.e., Ralph Robinson], transl., A Fruteful, and Pleasaunt Worke of the Best State of a Publyque Weale, and of the Newe Yle Called Utopia: […], London: […] [Steven Mierdman for] Abraham Vele, […], →OCLC:

     Homely gear and common ware.

4. (countable) A wheel with grooves (teeth) engraved on the outer circumference, such that two such devices can interlock and convey motion from one to the other; a gear wheel.

   Synonyms: cog, cogwheel, gearwheel

5. (countable, automotive, cycling) A particular combination or choice of interlocking gears, such that a particular gear ratio is achieved.
6. (countable, automotive) A configuration of the transmission of a motor car so as to achieve a particular ratio of engine to axle torque.
7. (aviation) Ellipsis of landing gear.

   gear-up landing

   Get the gear down quick!

8. (uncountable, slang) Recreational drugs, including steroids.

   getting on gear

   • 2003, Marianne Hancock, Looking for Oliver, page 90:

     "Have you got any gear? Dominic, have you got any acid?" Emma kept running her hands nervously through her hair. "Not LSD, man; that last trip freaked me out."

9. (uncountable, archaic) Stuff.
   • 1662, Henry More, An Antidote Against Atheism, Book III, A Collection of Several Philosophical Writings of Dr. Henry More, p. 113:

     When he was digged up, which was in the presence of the Magistracy of the Town, his body was found entire, not at all putrid, no ill smell about him, saving the mustiness of the grave-Clothes, his joynts limber and flexible, as in those that are alive, his skin only flaccid, but a more fresh grown in the room of it, the wound of his throat gaping, but no gear nor corruption in it; there was also observed a Magical mark in the great toe of his right foot, viz. an Excrescency in the form of a Rose.

10. (obsolete) Business matters; affairs; concern.
    • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto VIII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 30:

      goe they both together to their geare.

11. (obsolete, UK, dialect) Anything worthless; nonsense; rubbish.
    • March 29, 1549, Hugh Latimer, the fourth sermon preached before King Edward

      That servant of his that confessed and uttered this gear was an honest man.

gear (third-person singular simple present gears, present participle gearing, simple past and past participle geared)

1. (engineering, transitive) To provide with gearing; to fit with gears in order to achieve a desired gear ratio.
2. (engineering, intransitive) To be in gear, come into gear.
3. To dress; to put gear on; to harness.
4. (usually with to or toward(s)) To design or devise (something) so as to be suitable (for a particular type of person or a particular purpose).

   This shop is not really geared towards people of our age.

   They have geared the hotel mainly at tourists.

5. (finance) To borrow money in order to invest it in assets.

gear (comparative more gear, superlative most gear)

1. (chiefly Liverpool) great or fantastic

• Ager, GRAE, Gera, Rega, ager, areg, gare, rage

• geayr, geyre

From Middle Irish gér, from Old Irish gér.

gear (verbal noun gearey)

1. to laugh, chuckle

gear

1. sharp, keen
2. sour, acid

• G. Toner, M. Ní Mhaonaigh, S. Arbuthnot, D. Wodtko, M.-L. Theuerkauf, editors (2019), “gér”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language

• ġǣr, ġēr — Anglian

From Proto-West Germanic *jār, from Proto-Germanic *jērą, from Proto-Indo-European *yeh₁r-.

• IPA^(key): /jæ͜ɑːr/

ġēar n

1. year
   • The Dialogues of Solomon and Saturn

     Ic þē secge, hēo wæs iii and sixtiġ ġēara eald, ðā hēo belȳfen wæs...

     I tell thee, she was three and sixty years old when she died...

   • c. 9-12 CE, Anglo-Saxon Chronicle:

     Þis wæs fēorþes ġēares his rīċes

     This was in the fourth year of his reign.

   • late 10th century, Ælfric, "Saint Sebastian, Martyr"

     Þa wurdon hi ealle þurh þæt wundor ablicgede and þæs þægnes gebedda ðe þa gebroþra heold wæs for six gearum for swiðlicre untrumnysse...

     Then they were all astonished at that miracle; and the wife of the officer, who had charge of the brothers, for six years, through a severe sickness...

2. age, years old (+plural genitive)
   • late 10th century, Ælfric, "Passion of St. Julian and his Wife Basilissa"

     Þa wolde his fæder and his frynd ealle þæt he wifian sceolde þa ða he eahtetyne gæra wæs...

     Then his father desired, and all his friends likewise, that he should marry, when he was eighteen years old.

3. (good) harvest
   1. (Runic alphabet) name of the j-rune (ᛄ)

• Middle English: yeer, here, yere, ȝere
  • English: year
  • Scots: year

From an Old Galician-Portuguese *gear (compare geo), from Latin gelāre. Doublet of the borrowing gelar. Compare also Galician xear.

• Hyphenation: ge‧ar

gear (impersonal, third-person singular present geia, third-person singular preterite geou, past participle geado)

1. (impersonal) to frost (weather)

• IPA^(key): /ɡɪə̯r/

gear

1. together

• “gear (III)”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011