pat
/pæt/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.24 in modern English
5
Scrabble Score
3
Letters
1
Syllables
3
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A light tap or slap, especially with the hands.
Example Sentences
- "We heard a pat on the door."
- "Give Mary a pat on the shoulder to get her attention."
- "It looked like a tessellated work of pats of butter."
- "To show affection, he decided he would pat the boy on the head."
- "He came round to each of us to pat and speak to us for the last time; his voice sounded very sad."
- "I patted the cookie dough into shape."
Etymology
From Middle English pat (“a blow, stroke”), alteration (with loss of medial l) of *plat (> Scots plat (“a blow, buffet”)), from Old English plætt (“a sounding blow, a smack”), from Proto-West Germanic *platt (“a smack, slap, blow”), from Proto-Germanic *plat- (“to strike, beat”), from Proto-Indo-European *blod-, *bled- (“to strike, beat”). Cognate with Middle Dutch plat (“a smack, blow, slap”), Middle Low German plat (“a smack, blow, beating”), Middle High German plaz, blaz (“a resounding blow, bang, crash”). For loss of l, compare patch for platch; pate for plate, etc. See plat.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Usage
- Australian usage
- New Zealand usage
- British usage
- Slang
- Offensive
- Countable
- Uncountable
- American usage
Inflected Forms
pats (plural)
pats (present, singular)
patting (participle, present)
patted (participle, past)
patted (past)
more pat (comparative)
most pat (superlative)