mate
part of speech
noun (a mate, mates); verb (mate, mates, mated, mating)
meaning for a pupil
1) (UK, Australia, NZ, Ireland, informal) A friend: «He's my mate». tree →
2) A person you share something with, as in «classmate», «teammate», «flatmate». tree →
3) The partner of an animal, with which it has babies. tree →
4) (verb) Of animals: to come together to make babies. tree →
5) An officer on a ship («first mate»). tree →
6) In chess, short for «checkmate». tree →
sense in the lessons
In the Tanakh and Jewish tradition: Here it means a partner of an animal, so that there would be a male and a female of each kind in the ark. Interpretation: The animals came in pairs to keep each kind alive after the Flood. The rabbis noted that seven pairs of clean animals were taken so Noah could offer sacrifices later. In the primary lessons: In everyday British and Australian speech «mate» is a friendly word, often to say hello or thanks: «Cheers, mate!». In science lessons about life cycles: animals find a mate in spring, birds sing to attract a mate. In stories: «the first mate» on a pirate ship. In chess «mate» ends the game.
examples
- Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee seven and seven, each with his mate; and of the beasts that are not clean two and two, each with his mate; (Torah GEN.7.2, JPS 1917) tree →
- There shall the arrowsnake make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and brood under her shadow; yea, there shall the kites be gathered, every one with her mate. (Prophets ISA.34.15, JPS 1917) tree →
- Seek ye out of the book of the LORD, and read; no one of these shall be missing, none shall want her mate; for My mouth it hath commanded, and the breath thereof it hath gathered them. (Prophets ISA.34.16, JPS 1917) tree →
- I'm going to the park with my mates. tree →
- Thanks, mate! tree →
- Jamie is my best mate. tree →
- My teammates cheered when I scored. tree →
- Birds sing to attract a mate. tree →
- Penguins often stay with the same mate for years. tree →
- The captain gave orders to the first mate. tree →
- White moved the queen and said «mate». tree →
- I met my mates in the morning, a broken, scattered band. tree →
note
Countable: a mate, mates. «Mate» as «friend» is informal and common in the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand; Americans more often say «buddy» or «pal». It is in many compounds: classmate, playmate, roommate, shipmate.
In the corpora
- At bedtime Mum explains he had an awful week at work, and Dad comes up and says, "Sorry, mate.
- Vivid example: in Wellington, your big brother is about to screenshot his mate's private message and send it to the group.
- Dad pauses it: "They filmed about a hundred hours this week, mate.
- That is still copying, the way repainting your mate's bike doesn't make it your bike.
- Each building solves a problem: keeping cool, keeping eggs away from snakes, or winning a mate.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «mate» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.