Definition of "lay"

lay¹

/leɪ/

verb
third-person singular simple present lays, present participle laying, simple past and past participle laid
1. (transitive)
  1. To place down in a position of rest, or in a horizontal position.
    Quotations
    A stone was brought, and laid upon the mouth of the den.
    1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Daniel 6:17
    Now I lay me down to sleep, / I pray the Lord my Soul to keep. / If I should die before I ’wake, / I pray the Lord my Soul to take.
    1735, author unknown, The New-England Primer; as reported by Fred R. Shapiro, The Yale Book of Quotations, Yale University Press, 2006, pages 549–550
    He used to drop into my chambers once in a while to smoke, and was first-rate company. When I gave a dinner there was generally a cover laid for him.
    1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., page 2
    An indulgent playmate, Grannie would lay aside the long scratchy-looking letter she was writing (heavily crossed ‘to save notepaper’) and enter into the delightful pastime of ‘a chicken from Mr Whiteley's’.
    1977, Agatha Christie, chapter 4, in An Autobiography, part I, London: Collins
  2. (archaic) To cause to subside or abate.
    Quotations
    The cloudes, as things affrayd, before him flye; / But all so soone as his outrageous powre / Is layd, they fiercely then begin to shoure […]
    1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, book II, canto viii, verse xlviii
    But how upon the winds being laid, doth the ship cease to move?
    1662, Sir Thomas Salusbury, Galileo's Dialogue Concerning the Two World Systems, Dialogue 2
    He faced the spectres of the mindAnd laid them: thus he came at lengthTo find a stronger faith his own;And Power was with him in the night,Which makes the darkness and the light,And dwells not in the light alone,But in the darkness and the cloud
    1849, Alfred Lord Tennyson, In Memoriam A.H.H., canto XCVI
    Tessie lay among the cushions, her face a gray blot in the gloom, but her hands were clasped in mine and I knew that she knew and read my thoughts as I read hers, for we had understood the mystery of the Hyades and the Phantom of Truth was laid.
    1895, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, “The Yellow Sign”, in The King in Yellow
  3. To prepare (a plan, project etc.); to set out, establish (a law, principle).
    Quotations
    Even when I lay a long plan, it is never in the expectation that I will live to see it fulfilled.
    2006, Clive James, North Face of Soho, Picador, published 2007, page 48
  4. To install certain building materials, laying one thing on top of another.
  5. To produce and deposit an egg.
  6. To bet (that something is or is not the case).
  7. To deposit (a stake) as a wager; to stake; to risk.
    Quotations
    I dare lay mine honour / He will remain so.
    c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act II, scene i]
    He laid a hundred guineas with the laird of Slofferfield that he would drive four horses through the Slofferfield loch, and in the prank he had his bit chariot dung to pieces and a good mare killed.
    1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide
  8. (slang) To have sex with.
    Quotations
    'It's because he's a no-good son of a bitch who thinks it is smart to lay his friends' wives and brag about it.'
    1944, Raymond Chandler, The Lady in the Lake, Penguin, published 2011, page 11
  9. (law) To state; to allege.
  10. (military) To point; to aim.
  11. (ropemaking) To put the strands of (a rope, a cable, etc.) in their proper places and twist or unite them.
  12. (printing) To place and arrange (pages) for a form upon the imposing stone.
  13. (printing) To place (new type) properly in the cases.
  14. To apply; to put.
    Quotations
    She layeth her hands to the spindle.
    1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Proverbs 31:19
  15. To impose (a burden, punishment, command, tax, etc.).
    Quotations
    The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
    1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Isaiah 53:6
  16. To impute; to charge; to allege.
    Quotations
    God layeth not folly to them.
    1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Job 24:12
    Lay the fault on us.
    c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act II, scene iii]
  17. To present or offer.
2. (intransitive)
  1. (nautical) To take a position; to come or go.
  2. (proscribed, see usage notes) To lie: to rest in a horizontal position on a surface.
    Quotations
    If ever there was a perfect beauty afloat, she is one; and there she lays at Spithead, and anybody in England would take her for an eight-and-twenty. I was upon the platform two hours this afternoon, looking at her. She lays just astern of the Endymion, with the Cleopatra to larboard.
    1814 July, [Jane Austen], chapter VII, in Mansfield Park: […], volume III, London: […] T[homas] Egerton, […], page 151
    Lay, lady, lay. / Lay across my big brass bed.
    1969 July, Bob Dylan, “Lay Lady Lay”, in Nashville Skyline, Columbia
    Let me lay down beside you. / Let me always be with you.
    1974, John Denver, “Annie’s Song”, Back Home Again, RCA
noun
countable and uncountable, plural lays
1. Arrangement or relationship; layout.
2. A share of the profits in a business.
  Quotations
  I was already aware that in the whaling business they paid no wages; but all hands, including the captain, received certain shares of the profits called lays, and that these lays were proportioned to the degree of importance pertaining to the respective duties of the ship’s company.
  1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “chapter 16”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley
3. The direction a rope is twisted.
4. (colloquial) A casual sexual partner.
  Quotations
  Over the years she'd tried to tell himself that his uptown girl was just another lay.
  1996, JoAnn Ross, Southern Comforts, MIRA, published 1996, page 166
  To find a place like that and be discreet about it, Jones figured he needed help, so he went to see his favorite lay, Juan Carillo's woman, Carmen.
  2000, R. J. Kaiser, Fruitcake, MIRA, published 2000, page 288
  “Because I don't want William to be just another lay. I did the slut thing, T, and it got me into a lot of trouble years ago. […]
  2011, Kelly Meding, Trance, Pocket Books, pages 205–206
5. (colloquial) An act of sexual intercourse.
  Quotations
  Listening to this dismissal of his work, [Tennessee] Williams thought to himself of Wilder, “This character has never had a good lay.”
  1993, David Halberstam, The Fifties‎, Open Road Integrated Media, published 2012
  Does his make-up in his roomDouse himself with cheap perfumeEyeholes in a paper bagGreatest lay I ever had
  1996, Placebo (lyrics and music), “Nancy Boy”
  […] She didn't become this germ freak until Thomas died. I wonder if she just needs a good lay, you know, an all-nighter?" Toots said thoughtfully.
  2009, Fern Michaels, The Scoop, Kensington Books, pages 212–213
  “What she needs is a good lay. If she had someone to rock her world on a regular basis, she wouldn't be such a raging bit—”
  2011, Pamela Yaye, Promises We Make‎, Kimani Press, published 2011
6. (slang, archaic) A place or activity where someone spends a significant portion of their time.
  Quotations
  I shall be on that lay nae mair
  1818 July 25, Jedadiah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volumes (please specify |volume=I, II, III, or IV), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company
  Since our people have moved this boy on, and he's not to be found on his old lay
  1852 March – 1853 September, Charles Dickens, Bleak House, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1853
  "Well, you see, son," Kitcell had explained to Wilbur, "os-ten-siblee we are after shark-liver oil— and so we are; but also we are on any lay that turns up; ready for any game, from wrecking to barratry.
  1899, Frank Norris, Blix. Moran of the Lady Letty. Essays on authorship, page 155
7. The laying of eggs.
8. (obsolete) A layer.
  Quotations
  […] lay in the bottom of an earthen pot some dried vine leaves, and so make a lay of Pears, and leaves till the pot is filled up, laying betwixt each lay some sliced Ginger […]
  1677, Hannah Woolley, The Compleat Servant-Maid‎, London: T. Passinger, page 5
  […] the whole Body of the Church is chequer’d with different Lays of White and Black Marble […]
  1718, Joseph Addison, “Sienna, Leghorne, Pisa”, in Remarks on Several Parts of Italy, &c. in the Years 1701, 1702, 1703‎, London: J. Tonson, page 300
  […] when we examine the Scarf-Skin with a Microscope, it appears to be made up of several Lays of exceeding small Scales, which cover one another more or less […]
  1724, Thomas Spooner, chapter 2, in A Compendious Treatise of the Diseases of the Skin‎, London, page 20
  […] in one particular it exceeds the fen birds, for it has two tastes; it being brown and white meat: under a lay of brown is a lay of white meat […]
  1766, Thomas Amory, The Life of John Buncle, Esq., London: J. Johnson and B. Davenport, Volume 2, Section 1, p. 16, footnote 1
9. (obsolete) A basis or ground.
  Quotations
  On this lay or ground we should also add the finishing colours.
  1835, Richard architetto Brown, The Principles of Practical Perspective, page 122
  In the first MacColl patent the pattern chain and engaging rod were carried on the swinging lay on which the needle bars are mounted.
  1899, “MacColl v. Crompton Loom works”, in The Federal Reporter, volume 95, page 990

lay²

/leɪ/

noun
plural lays
1. A lake.

lay³

/leɪ/

adjective
comparative more lay, superlative most lay
1. Not belonging to the clergy, but associated with them.
2. Non-professional; not being a member of an organized institution.
  Quotations
  It is true that in adopting the short view many of the younger economists have not merely taken over the lay notions bodily.
  1958, Jacob Viner, The Long View and the Short, page 112
  He hasn't caught a mouse since he was a slip of a kitten. Except when eating, he does nothing but sleep. [...] It's a sort of disease. There's a scientific name for it. Trau- something. Traumatic symplegia, that's it. This cat has traumatic symplegia. In other words, putting it in simple language adapted to the lay mind, where other cats are content to get their eight hours, Augustus wants his twenty-four.
  1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter VII
3. (card games) Not trumps.
4. (obsolete) Not educated or cultivated; ignorant.

lay⁴

/leɪ/

verb
1. simple past of lie (etymology 1)
  Quotations
  But unlike many other tunnels that lay idle and decaying, Catesby has now found a new use as an aerodynamic wind tunnel for the motor industry.
  2023 November 29, Peter Plisner, “The winds of change in Catesby Tunnel”, in RAIL, number 997, page 56

lay⁵

/leɪ/

noun
plural lays
1. A ballad or sung poem; a short poem or narrative, usually intended to be sung.
  Quotations
  I strive, with wakeful melody, to cheerThe sullen gloom, sweet Philomel! like thee,And call the stars to listen: every starIs deaf to mine, enamour'd of thy lay.
  1742, Edward Young, The Complaint: or Night-Thoughts on Life, Death & Immortality, Night I
  1805, Sir Walter Scott., The Lay of the Last Minstrel
2. A lyrical, narrative poem written in octosyllabic couplets that often deals with tales of adventure and romance.
  Quotations
  Sad is the note and sad the lay, but mirth we meet not every day.
  1945: "The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun" by JRR Tolkien

lay⁶

/leɪ/

noun
plural lays
1. (obsolete) A meadow; a lea.
  Quotations
  Having destroyed all old lays, I have no other hay than clover.
  1808, John Curwen, Hints on the Economy of Feeding Stock and Bettering the Condition of the Poor

lay⁷

/leɪ/

noun
plural lays
1. (obsolete) A law.
  Quotations
  A woman worthy of immortall prayse, / Which for this Realme found many goodly layes
  1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, stanza 42
2. (obsolete) An obligation; a vow.
  Quotations
  they bound themselues by a sacred lay and oth to fight it out to the last man
  1601, C[aius] Plinius Secundus [i.e., Pliny the Elder], “(please specify |book=I to XXXVII)”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Historie of the World. Commonly Called, The Naturall Historie of C. Plinius Secundus. […], (please specify |tome=1 or 2), London: […] Adam Islip, published 1635

lay⁸

/leɪ/

verb
third-person singular simple present lays, present participle laying, simple past and past participle laid
1. (Judaism, transitive) To don or put on (tefillin (phylacteries)).

Definition of "lay"

lay1

verb

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

noun

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

Quotations

lay2

noun

lay3

adjective

Quotations

lay4

verb

Quotations

lay5

noun

Quotations

Quotations

lay6

noun

Quotations

lay7

noun

Quotations

Quotations

lay8

verb

lay¹

lay²

lay³

lay⁴

lay⁵

lay⁶

lay⁷

lay⁸