rag

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rag

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• (General American, Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɹæɡ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -æɡ

From Middle English ragge, from Old English ragg (suggested by derivative raggiġ (“shaggy; bristly; ragged”)), from Old Norse rǫgg (“tuft; shagginess”), from Proto-Germanic *rawwa-, probably related to *rūhaz. Cognate with Swedish ragg. Related to rug.

rag (plural rags)

1. (especially in the plural) Tattered clothes (clothing).

   —What a pretty dress! —What, this old rag?

   It's semiformal. I can't show up dressed in rags!

   rags to riches

   • 1684, John Dryden, Miscellany Poems: Containing a New Translation of Virgills Eclogues, Ovid's Love Elegies, Odes of Horace and Other Authors, The twenty-ninth ode of the first book of Horace:

     And virtue, though in rags, will keep me warm.

2. A piece of old cloth, especially one used for cleaning, patching, etc.; a tattered piece of cloth; a shred or tatter.

   Hyponyms: dishrag, do-rag, washrag

   • 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book III, lines 490-491:

     Cowls, hoods, and habits, with their wearers, toss'd, / And flutter'd into rags; then reliques, beads,

   • 1655, Thomas Fuller, The Church-history of Britain from the Birth of Jesus Christ until the year MDCXLVIII‎, page 399:

     […] even by the law of their own might and malice, not having otherwise any rag of legality to cover the shame of their cruelty.

3. (derogatory) A shabby, beggarly person; synonym of ragamuffin.
   • 1623, Ben Jonson, Time Vindicated to Himself and to His Honours:

     The other zealous rag is the compositor, / Who in an angle where the ants inhabit, / (The emblems of his labors) will sit curl'd

   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, A Veue of the Present State of Irelande:

     For upon the like Proclamation there, they all came in, both tag and rag

4. A ragged edge in metalworking.

   Coordinate terms: bur, burr

5. (nautical, slang) A sail, or any piece of canvas.
   • 1864, James Russell Lowell, My Garden Acquaintance; A Good Word for Winter; A Moosehead Journal, page 83:

     Our ship was a clipper, with every rag set, stunsails, sky-scrapers, and all.

   • 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 191:

     "'Oh yes, that's all very well, but we haven't done with it yet,' said the lad, 'we shall have it worse directly,' and he ordered them to furl every rag but the mizen."

6. (singular or plural, slang) Sanitary napkins, pads, or other materials used to absorb menstrual discharge.
   • 2020, Pip Williams, The Dictionary of Lost Words, page 56:

     "It's heaviest on the first day, which might be why it hurts so much. After that, it slows down and eventually stops, but you'll need the rags for about a week."

7. (slang, derogatory) A newspaper or magazine, especially one whose journalism is considered to be of poor quality.

   Synonym: fish wrap

   • 1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World , London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC:

     "You must behave yourself, dear. Mr. Malone is a Pressman. He will have it all in his rag to-morrow, and sell an extra dozen among our neighbors."

8. (poker) A poor, low-ranking kicker.^[1]

   I have ace-four on my hand. In other words, I have ace-rag.

9. (slang, theater) A curtain of various kinds.
10. (dated) A person suffering from exhaustion or lack of energy.
    • 1925 July – 1926 May, A Conan Doyle, “(please specify the chapter number)”, in The Land of Mist (eBook no. 0601351h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, published April 2019:

      "It took it out of me, though. I'm a rag this morning." "They work you too hard, dear."

11. (slang, obsolete) A banknote.
    • 1876, The Shamrock, volume 14:

      What was he at, do you think? Counting bank-notes; he had bundles of them. […] Well, Guv'nor, he stood up by-and-by, and taking the bundles of rags, the big uns in one hand, tother ones in tother, he toddled out of the room; […] So I tucked my violin under my arm, and sallied out after the old budgy ragman, determined to ease him of his load at the very first lonesome corner I could track him to.

• → Kashubian: reksa (United States)

rag (third-person singular simple present rags, present participle ragging, simple past and past participle ragged)

1. (transitive) To decorate (a wall, etc.) by applying paint with a rag.
2. (intransitive) To become tattered.
3. (intransitive, vulgar, slang, sometimes euphemistic) To menstruate.

Unknown origin; perhaps the same word as Etymology 1, above.

rag (countable and uncountable, plural rags)

1. A coarse kind of rock, somewhat cellular in texture; ragstone.
   • 2003, Peter Ackroyd, The Clerkenwell Tales, page 1:

     the three walls around the garden, each one of thirty-three feet, were built out of three layers of stone — pebble stone, flint and rag stone.

• coral rag
• Kentish rag
• ragwork
• Rowley rag

rag (third-person singular simple present rags, present participle ragging, simple past and past participle ragged)

2. To break (ore) into lumps for sorting.

   Hypernym: dress

4. To cut or dress roughly, as a grindstone.

   Hypernym: dress

   Near-synonym: rough

Uncertain. Ideas about the scolding and tormenting senses being related to on the rag are only speculative.

rag (third-person singular simple present rags, present participle ragging, simple past and past participle ragged)

2. To scold or tell off; to torment; to banter.
4. (British slang) To drive a car or another vehicle in a hard, fast or unsympathetic manner.

   Synonyms: beat, thrash

   Hypernym: ride hard and put away wet

6. To tease or torment, especially at a university; to bully, to haze.

• bullirag
• rag the puck
• rag on

rag (plural rags)

1. (dated) A prank or practical joke.
   • 1929, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, When the World Screamed‎:

     The rascal winked and grinned. 'There are always and means,' said he. 'But don't blame your foreman. He thought it was just a rag. I swapped clothes with his assistant, and in I came.'

2. (UK, Ireland) A society run by university students for the purpose of charitable fundraising.

• rag day
• rag week

Perhaps from ragged. Compare later ragtime.

rag (plural rags)

1. (obsolete, US) An informal dance party featuring music played by African-American string bands.
2. A ragtime song, dance or piece of music.

rag (third-person singular simple present rags, present participle ragging, simple past and past participle ragged)

1. (transitive, informal) To play or compose (a piece, melody, etc.) in syncopated time.
   • 2020, Ned Bennett, How To Play Jazz Saxophone, page 9:

     Now let's rag it. We'll keep the notes more or less the same but make the rhythm more fun.

2. (intransitive, informal) To dance to ragtime music.
3. (music, obsolete) To add syncopation (to a tune) and thereby make it appropriate for a ragtime song.^[2]

• (banknote): John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary

• Gra, gar, grá, Arg., Gar, RGA, GAR, ARG, arg, agr-, arg.

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

rag

1. before

From Proto-Brythonic *rrak, from Proto-Indo-European *proko-, whence also Old Church Slavonic прокъ (prokŭ, “remaining”), from Proto-Indo-European *pro-.

rag

1. for
2. in order to

Unknown, only found to be related to West Frisian reach, though possibly more distantly to Old Saxon raginna (“rough hair”), Old English ragu (“moss”).

• IPA^(key): /rɑx/

• Audio:

  (file)

rag n (plural raggen, diminutive ragje n)

1. spider silk

• spinrag

• ragfijn

From English rag.

• IPA^(key): /ˈrɛɡ/

rag n (plural rags, diminutive ragje n)

1. a piece of ragtime music

rag

1. singular imperative of ragen
2. (colloquial) first-person singular present of ragen

From Burmese ဓား (dha:) ("knife" or "sword").

• IPA^(key): /ʈa˧˩̤/

rag

1. knife, small sword

Back-formation from ragad. Created during the Hungarian language reform, which took place in the 18th–19th centuries.

• IPA^(key):

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: rag
• Rhymes: -ɒɡ

rag (plural ragok)

1. (grammar) terminal inflectional suffix/affix, termination, ending (for nominals, mostly case endings; for verbs and postpositions, personal suffixes; almost exclusively at the very end of a word in Hungarian)

   Hypernym: toldalék

   Coordinate terms: képző, jel

• Appendix:Hungarian suffixes

• (suffix): rag in Bárczi, Géza and László Országh. A magyar nyelv értelmező szótára (“The Explanatory Dictionary of the Hungarian Language”, abbr.: ÉrtSz.). Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1959–1962. Fifth ed., 1992: →ISBN
• ( a kind of beam or a part of the roof): rag in Bárczi, Géza and László Országh. A magyar nyelv értelmező szótára (“The Explanatory Dictionary of the Hungarian Language”, abbr.: ÉrtSz.). Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1959–1962. Fifth ed., 1992: →ISBN

• reeg (Mooring)
• Rech (Sylt)

From Old Frisian *hregg, from Proto-West Germanic *hrugi.

rag m (plural rager)

1. (Föhr-Amrum) back (rear of the body)

From Proto-Celtic *razgo-, from Proto-Indo-European *Hreyǵ- (“to bind”), see also Middle High German ric (“string, band”) and Old Irish riag (“a type of torture”).

rag

1. stiff, rigid, inflexible
2. stubborn, obstinate

• rag-mhuinealach

• MacBain, Alexander, Mackay, Eneas (1911) “rag”, in An Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language‎, Stirling, →ISBN

rag ?

1. man

Cognate with Northern Kurdish reg.

rag

1. root

• (Standard Zhuang) IPA^(key): /ɣaːk˧/
• Tone numbers: rag⁸
• Hyphenation: rag

From Proto-Tai *C̬.raːkᴰ (“root”). Cognate with Thai ราก (râak), Northern Thai ᩁᩣ᩠ᨠ, Khün ᩁᩣ᩠ᨠ, Lao ຮາກ (hāk), Lü ᦣᦱᧅ (haak), Tai Dam ꪭꪱꪀ, Shan ႁၢၵ်ႈ (hāak), Ahom 𑜍𑜀𑜫 (rak), Nong Zhuang laeg, Zuojiang Zhuang lag, Saek ร̄าก.

rag (1957–1982 spelling rag)

1. root

From Proto-Tai *C̬.laːkᴰ (“to pull; to drag”). Cognate with Thai ลาก (lâak), Lao ລາກ (lāk), Shan လၢၵ်ႈ (lāak), Ahom 𑜎𑜀𑜫 (lak), Nong Zhuang laeg, Zuojiang Zhuang lag.

rag (1957–1982 spelling rag)

1. to drag; to pull; to haul