rule
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English
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ɹuːl/
- (Wales) IPA(key): /ɹɪu̯l/
- (Scotland, Northern Ireland) IPA(key): /ɹʉl/
Audio (US); : (file) Audio (US); : (file) - Rhymes: -uːl
Etymology 1
From Middle English reule, rewle, rule, borrowed from Old French riule, reule, from Latin regula (“straight stick, bar, ruler, pattern”), from regō (“to keep straight, direct, govern, rule”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₃réǵeti (“to straighten; right”), from the root *h₃reǵ-; see regent. Doublet of rail, regal, regula, and rigol.
Noun
rule (countable and uncountable, plural rules)
- A regulation, law, guideline.
- Synonyms: see Thesaurus:rule
- All participants must adhere to the rules.
- a. 1694, John Tillotson, Of The Obligations of Christians to a Holy Life:
- We profess to have embraced a religion which contains the most exact rules for the government of our lives.
- 2013 June 22, “T time”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 68:
- The ability to shift profits to low-tax countries by locating intellectual property in them […] is often assumed to be the preserve of high-tech companies. […] current tax rules make it easy for all sorts of firms to generate […] “stateless income”: profit subject to tax in a jurisdiction that is neither the location of the factors of production that generate the income nor where the parent firm is domiciled.
- A regulating principle.
- c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, :
- There's little can be said in 't; 'Tis against the rule of nature.
- The act of ruling; administration of law; government; empire; authority; control.
- 1611, The Holy Bible, (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, Hebrews 13:17:
- Obey them that have the rule over you.
- 1725, Homer, “Book III”, in [Alexander Pope], transl., The Odyssey of Homer. , volume I, London: Bernard Lintot, →OCLC:
- His stern rule the groaning land obeyed.
- A normal condition or state of affairs.
- My rule is to rise at six o'clock.
- As a rule, our senior editors are serious-minded.
- (obsolete) Conduct; behaviour.
- c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, :
- This uncivil rule; she shall know of it.
- (law) An order regulating the practice of the courts, or an order made between parties to an action or a suit.
- (mathematics) A determinate method prescribed for performing any operation and producing a certain result.
- a rule for extracting the cube root
- A ruler; device for measuring, a straightedge, a measure.
- a. 1716, Robert South, Sermons:
- As we may observe in the Works of Art, a Judicious Artist will indeed use his Eye, but he will trust only to his Rule.
- 1981, Aristotle, “Rhetoric, the Counterpart of Dialectic”, in W. Rhys Roberts, Ingram Bywater, transl., Rhetoric and On Poetics, Pennsylvania: The Franklin Library, →OL:
- It is not right to pervert the judge by moving him to anger or envy or pity—one might as well warp a carpenter's rule before using it.
- A straight line (continuous mark, as made by a pen or the like), especially one lying across a paper as a guide for writing.
- (printing, dated) A thin plate of brass or other metal, of the same height as the type, and used for printing lines, as between columns on the same page, or in tabular work.
Derived terms
(Terms derived from the noun rule):
- 180-degree rule
- 20-80 rule
- 3-revert rule
- 4-to-1 rule
- 50/30/20 rule
- 50-30-20 rule
- 6-2-1 rule
- 621 rule
- 68-95-99.7 rule
- 80-20 rule
- 8x8 rule
- Abegg's rule
- adverse interest rule
- Allen's rule
- Ampère's rule
- area rule
- as a rule
- as-if rule
- at-rule
- away goals rule
- baseball rule
- batter rule
- Bergmann's rule
- best evidence rule
- blood rule
- board rule
- Born rule
- Born's rule
- boukólos rule
- bright-line rule
- Buckley rule
- Buckley's rule
- business rule
- cab-rank rule
- cardinal rule
- chain rule
- Chatham House rule
- composing rule
- Cope's rule
- cosine rule
- Cramer's rule
- Cromwell's rule
- crumbling skull rule
- cube rule
- direct rule
- divide and rule
- doomsday rule
- Dühring's rule
- Durham rule
- Eddie the Eagle rule
- eggshell rule
- Emery's rule
- empirical rule
- em rule
- en rule
- every rule has an exception
- exception that proves the rule
- exclusionary rule
- felony murder rule
- fifty-move rule
- firefighter's rule
- fireman's rule
- five-second rule
- flat tire rule
- Fleming's right-hand rule
- formation rule
- Foster's rule
- frame rule
- gag rule
- Geiger-Nuttall rule
- Gloger's rule
- golden rule
- Goldwater rule
- Gougu rule
- grandmother rule
- ground rule
- Haldane's rule
- Hastert rule
- Hebb's rule
- home rule
- home rule class
- Horner's rule
- house rule
- inference rule
- infield fly rule
- island rule
- jointing rule
- Jordan rule
- Jordan's rule
- Kasha's rule
- last antecedent rule
- Las Vegas rule
- Lesbian rule
- lesbian rule
- L'Hôpital's rule
- l'Hôpital's rule
- Lipinski's rule of five
- literal rule
- looks-like-a-function rule
- mailbox rule
- majority rule
- Markovnikov's rule
- Markownikoff's rule
- Meeussen's rule
- mercy rule
- Miranda rule
- M'Naghten rule
- mob rule
- Mull of Kintyre rule
- nasciturus rule
- Newton-Cotes rule
- ninety-ninety rule
- octet rule
- Oddo-Harkins rule
- off-side rule
- one-drop rule
- personal rule
- Pfizer's rule of five
- phase rule
- pie rule
- platinum rule
- plumb rule
- plurality rule
- postal rule
- precedence rule
- product rule
- prophylactic rule
- prudent man rule
- Rapoport's rule
- Rent's rule
- reverse one-drop rule
- right-hand rule
- Robert's Rules of Order
- Rome rule
- rule-based
- rule book
- rule-book
- rule-bound
- rule joint
- rule nisi
- rule of 72
- rule of action
- rule of Colel
- rule of cool
- rule of coss
- rule of decision
- rule of engagement
- rule of five
- rule of four
- rule of law
- rule of lenity
- rule of man
- rule of order
- rule of reason
- rule of recognition
- rule of sevens
- rule of strict construction
- rule of succession
- rule of the road
- rule of the shorter term
- rule of thirds
- rule of three
- rule-of-thumb
- rule of thumb
- rule of tincture
- rule of two
- rules-based order
- ruleset
- rule utilitarianism
- run the rule over
- Saytseff's rule
- selection rule
- self-rule
- setting rule
- silver rule
- Simpson's rule
- sine rule
- slayer rule
- slide rule
- sliding-rule
- space rule
- standing rule
- ten-second rule
- there is an exception to every rule
- thin skull rule
- Thornton's rule
- three-revert rule
- three-second rule
- three seconds rule
- touch-move rule
- transformational rule
- trapezium rule
- trapezoidal rule
- trapezoid rule
- Trouton's rule
- two-person rule
- two-pizza rule
- two second rule
- two-second rule
- under the rule
- unspoken rule
- unwritten rule
- Vegas rule
- Wallace rule of nines
- white coat rule
- work rule
- work-to-rule
- work to rule
- Zaitsev's rule
- zero one infinity rule
Related terms
Collocations
Collocations
- legal rules
- constitutional rule
- strict rules
- general rules
- specific rules
- basic rules
- unwritten rules
- unspoken rules
- rigid rules
- stupid rules
- silly rules
Translations
regulation
|
straight-edge — see ruler
the act of ruling; control
| ||||||
a normal condition or state of affairs
Etymology 2
From Middle English reulen, rulen, borrowed from Old French riuler, from Latin regulāre (“to regulate, rule”), from regula (“a rule”); see regular and regulate.
Verb
rule (third-person singular simple present rules, present participle ruling, simple past and past participle ruled)
- (transitive, stative) To regulate, be in charge of, make decisions for, reign over.
- 1918, W B Maxwell, chapter XIII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
- And Vickers launched forth into a tirade very different from his platform utterances. He spoke with extreme contempt of the dense stupidity exhibited on all occasions by the working classes. He said that if you wanted to do anything for them, you must rule them, not pamper them. Soft heartedness caused more harm than good.
- (slang, intransitive, stative) To excel.
- Synonyms: (slang) rock; see also Thesaurus:excel
- Antonyms: stink, (vulgar slang) suck
- This game rules!
- (intransitive) To decide judicially.
- 2013 June 21, Karen McVeigh, “US rules human genes can't be patented”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 2, page 10:
- The US supreme court has ruled unanimously that natural human genes cannot be patented, a decision that scientists and civil rights campaigners said removed a major barrier to patient care and medical innovation.
- (transitive) To establish or settle by, or as by, a rule; to fix by universal or general consent, or by common practice.
- 1687, Francis Atterbury, An Answer to Some Considerations on the Spirit of Martin Luther and the Original of the Reformation; , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Theater, →OCLC:
- That's a ruled case with the school-men.
- (transitive) To mark (paper or the like) with rules (lines).
Conjugation
Conjugation of rule
| infinitive | (to) rule | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| present tense | past tense | ||
| 1st-person singular | rule | ruled | |
| 2nd-person singular | rule, rulest† | ruled, ruledst† | |
| 3rd-person singular | rules, ruleth† | ruled | |
| plural | rule | ||
| subjunctive | rule | ruled | |
| imperative | rule | — | |
| participles | ruling | ruled | |
Derived terms
(Terms derived from rule (verb)):
Translations
to regulate, be in charge of, make decisions for, reign over
| |||||||
slang: to excel
to mark with lines
|
to decide judicially
|
Etymology 3
Related to revel.
Noun
rule
Verb
rule (third-person singular simple present rules, present participle ruling, simple past and past participle ruled)
- (obsolete, intransitive) To revel.
Further reading
- “rule”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “rule”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
- “rule”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
- rule in Britannica Dictionary
- rule in Sentence collocations by Cambridge Dictionary
- rule in Ozdic collocation dictionary
- rule in WordReference English Collocations
Anagrams
Czech
Pronunciation
Noun
rule f
Igala
Etymology
Pronunciation
Verb
rúlé
- to run
Spanish
Verb
rule
- inflection of rular: