trump

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /tɹʌmp/
• (some accents) IPA^(key):

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• Audio (UK)

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• Rhymes: -ʌmp
• Homophone: Trump

Etymology 1

Possibly from French triomphe (“triumph”) or Old French triumphe. If so, it is a doublet of triumph and thriambus. Compare German Trumpf.

This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

Noun

trump (plural trumps)

1. (card games) The suit, in a game of cards, that outranks all others.

   Diamonds were declared trump(s).

   • 1730, Jonathan Swift, “Death And Daphne,”, in Some Verse Pieces:

     And now her Heart with Pleasure jumps,
     She scarce remembers what is Trumps.

2. (card games) A playing card of that suit.

   He played an even higher trump.

3. (figuratively) Something that gives one an advantage, especially one held in reserve.
   • 1593, anonymous author, The Life and Death of Iacke Straw , Act IV:

     VVere Iacke Strawe a liue againe,
     And I in as good poſſibility as euer I was,
     I would lay a ſurer trumpe,
     Ere I would loſe ſo faire a tricke.

4. (colloquial, now rare) An excellent person; a fine fellow, a good egg.
   • 1838, Abraham Lincoln, “Address Before the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois”, in The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions‎, archived from the original on 5 February 2013:

     [W]e permitted no hostile foot to pass over or desecrate his resting place; shall be that which to learn the last trump shall awaken our WASHINGTON.

   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “chapter 13”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:

     All hands voted Queequeg a noble trump; the captain begged his pardon.

   • 1868–1869, Louisa M[ay] Alcott, Little Women: , (please specify |part=1 or 2), Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, →OCLC, pages 19 and 163:

     Brooke was a trump to telegraph right off.

   • 1854, Arthur Pendennis [pseudonym; William Makepeace Thackeray], The Newcomes: Memoirs of a Most Respectable Family, volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, , →OCLC:

     Alfred is a trump, I think you say.

5. An old card game, almost identical to whist; the game of ruff.
   • c. 1529, Hugh Latimer, Sermons on the Card:

     There be many one that breaketh this carde, […] and playeth there with oftentimes at the blinde trompe, wherby they be no winners but great losers

   • 1598, John Florio, “Trump”, in A Worlde of Words, or Most Copious, and Exact Dictionarie in Italian and English, , London: Arnold Hatfield for Edw Blount, →OCLC:

     Trionfo, […] also a trump at cards, or the play called trump or ruff.

6. A card of the major arcana of the tarot.

Usage notes

For the top-ranking suit as a whole, American usage favors the singular trump and British usage the plural trumps.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

trump (third-person singular simple present trumps, present participle trumping, simple past and past participle trumped)

1. (transitive, card games) To play on (a card of another suit) with a trump.

   He knew the hand was lost when his ace was trumped.

   • 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 52, in The History of Pendennis. , volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, , published 1849–1850, →OCLC:

     He lost his money at whist after dinner, and actually trumped his partner’s highest spade.

2. (intransitive, card games) To play a trump, or to take a trick with a trump.
3. (transitive) To get the better of, or finesse, a competitor.
   • 1629 (first performance), B[en] Jonson, The New Inne. Or, The Light Heart. , London: Thomas Harper, for Thomas Alchorne, , published 1631, →OCLC, (please specify the page), (please specify the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):
     , Act 1, Scene 3

     to trick or trump mankind

4. (transitive, dated) To impose unfairly; to palm off.
   • 1699, Charles Leslie, A Short and Easy Method with the Deists:

     Authors have been trumped upon us.

5. (transitive) To supersede.

   In this election, it would seem issues of national security trumped economic issues.

6. (transitive) To outweigh; be stronger, greater, bigger than or in other way superior to.

Synonyms

• (to play a trump card on another suit): ruff
• (to get the better of a competitor): outsmart

Coordinate terms

• (to play a trump card on another suit): underruff, overruff

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English trumpe, trompe (“trumpet”) from Old French trompe (“horn, trump, trumpet”), from Frankish *trumpa, *trumba (“trumpet”), from a common Germanic word of imitative origin. Doublet of tulumba and tromp.

Akin to Old High German trumpa, trumba (“horn, trumpet”), Middle Dutch tromme (“drum”), Middle Low German trumme (“drum”). More at trumpet, drum.

Noun

trump (plural trumps)

1. (archaic) A trumpet.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible,  (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, 1 Corinthians 15:52:

     In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible

   • 1798, Joseph Hopkinson, Hail, Columbia:

     Sound, sound the trump of fame,

2. (UK, euphemistic, slang) Flatulence.
3. The noise made by an elephant through its trunk.

Derived terms

Verb

trump (third-person singular simple present trumps, present participle trumping, simple past and past participle trumped)

1. To blow a trumpet.
2. (intransitive, UK, euphemistic, slang) To flatulate.

   And without warning me, as he lay there, he suddenly trumped next to me in bed.

   Who trumped?

Etymology 3

Shortening of Jew's-trump, which may be from French jeu-trump, jeu tromp, jeu trompe (a trump, or toy, to play with).

Noun

trump (plural trumps)

1. (dated, music) Synonym of Jew's harp.

Further reading

• Trump in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)