different between cut vs shut

English

Etymology

From Middle English cutten, kitten, kytten, ketten (“to cut”) (compare Scots kut, kit (“to cut”)), of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse kytja, kutta, from Proto-Germanic *kutjan?, *kuttan? (“to cut”), of uncertain origin, perhaps related to Proto-Germanic *kwetw? (“meat, flesh”) (compare Old Norse kvett (“meat”)). Akin to Middle Swedish kotta (“to cut or carve with a knife”) (compare dialectal Swedish kåta, kuta (“to cut or chip with a knife”), Swedish kuta, kytti (“a knife”)), Norwegian kutte (“to cut”), Icelandic kuta (“to cut with a knife”), Old Norse kuti (“small knife”), Norwegian kyttel, kytel, kjutul (“pointed slip of wood used to strip bark”).

Displaced native Middle English snithen (from Old English sn?þan; compare German schneiden), which still survives in some dialects as snithe.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /k?t/
• Rhymes: -?t

Verb

cut (third-person singular simple present cuts, present participle cutting, simple past and past participle cut)

1. (transitive) To incise, to cut into the surface of something.
   1. To perform an incision on, for example with a knife.
   2. To divide with a knife, scissors, or another sharp instrument.
   3. To form or shape by cutting.
   4. (slang) To wound with a knife.
      • 1990, Stephen Dobyns, The house on Alexandrine

        We don't want your money no more. We just going to cut you.

   5. (intransitive) To engage in self-harm by making cuts in one's own skin.

      The patient said she had been cutting since the age of thirteen.

   6. To deliver a stroke with a whip or like instrument to.

      • “My Continental prominence is improving,” I commented dryly. ¶ Von Lindowe cut at a furze bush with his silver-mounted rattan. ¶ “Quite so,” he said as dryly, his hand at his mustache. “I may say if your intentions were known your life would not be worth a curse.”

   7. To wound or hurt deeply the sensibilities of; to pierce.
      • 1829, Elijah Hoole, Personal Narrative of a Mission to the South of India, from 1820 to 1828

        she feared she should laugh to hear an European preach in Tamul , but on the contrary , was cut to the heart by what she heard

   8. To castrate or geld.

   9. To interfere, as a horse; to strike one foot against the opposite foot or ankle in using the legs.
2. (intransitive) To admit of incision or severance; to yield to a cutting instrument.
   • 1858, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table, The Deacon's Masterpiece, in Chapter XI:

     The panels of white-wood that cuts like cheese, / But lasts like iron for things like these;

3. (transitive, social) To separate, remove, reject or reduce.
   1. To separate or omit, in a situation where one was previously associated.

   2. To abridge or shorten a work; to remove a portion of a recording during editing.
   3. To reduce, especially intentionally.
   4. To absent oneself from (a class, an appointment, etc.).
      • 1833, Thomas Hamilton, Men and Manners in America

        An English tradesman is always solicitous to cut the shop whenever he can do so with impunity.

   5. To ignore as a social snub.
      • 1903, Samuel Barber, The Way of All Flesh, ch 73:

        At first it had been very painful to him to meet any of his old friends, [...] but this soon passed; either they cut him, or he cut them; it was not nice being cut for the first time or two, but after that, it became rather pleasant than not [...] The ordeal is a painful one, but if a man's moral and intellectual constitution are naturally sound, there is nothing which will give him so much strength of character as having been well cut.

4. (intransitive, film) To make an abrupt transition from one scene or image to another.

   The camera then cut to the woman on the front row who was clearly overcome and crying tears of joy.

5. (transitive, film) To edit a film by selecting takes from original footage.
6. (transitive, computing) To remove (text, a picture, etc.) and place in memory in order to paste at a later time.

7. (intransitive) To enter a queue in the wrong place.

8. (intransitive) To intersect or cross in such a way as to divide in half or nearly so.
9. (transitive, cricket) To make the ball spin sideways by running one's fingers down the side of the ball while bowling it. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
10. (transitive, cricket) To deflect (a bowled ball) to the off, with a chopping movement of the bat.
11. (intransitive) To change direction suddenly.

12. (transitive, intransitive) To divide a pack of playing cards into two.

13. (transitive, slang) To write.

14. (transitive, slang) To dilute or adulterate something, especially a recreational drug.

15. (transitive) To exhibit (a quality).
16. (transitive) To stop, disengage, or cease.

    Synonym: cut out

17. (sports) To drive (a ball) to one side, as by (in billiards or croquet) hitting it fine with another ball, or (in tennis) striking it with the racket inclined.
18. (bodybuilding) To lose body mass after bulking, aiming to keep the additional muscle but lose the fat.
19. To perform (a dancing movement etc.).

    to cut a caper

Synonyms

• See Thesaurus:cut

Troponyms

• chop, hack, slice, trim

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

See also

• copy
• paste

Adjective

cut (comparative more cut, superlative most cut)

1. (participial adjective) Having been cut.
2. Reduced.

3. (of a gem) Carved into a shape; not raw.
4. (Can we clean up⁽⁺⁾ this sense?) (cricket, of a shot) Played with a horizontal bat to hit the ball backward of point.
5. (bodybuilding) Having muscular definition in which individual groups of muscle fibers stand out among larger muscles.
   • 1988, Steve Holman, "Christian Conquers Columbus", Ironman 47 (6): 28-34.

     Or how 'bout Shane DiMora? Could he possibly get rip-roaring cut this time around?

   • 2010, Bill Geiger, "6-pack Abs in 9 Weeks", Reps! 17:106

     That's the premise of the overload principle, and it must be applied, even to ab training, if you're going to develop a cut, ripped midsection.

6. (informal) Circumcised or having been the subject of female genital mutilation.
7. (Australia, New Zealand, slang) Emotionally hurt.
8. (slang, New Zealand, formerly Britain) Intoxicated as a result of drugs or alcohol.

Synonyms

• (intoxicated): See Thesaurus:drunk

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Noun

cut (countable and uncountable, plural cuts)

1. The act of cutting.

2. The result of cutting.

3. An opening resulting from cutting; an incision or wound.

4. A notch, passage, or channel made by cutting or digging; a furrow; a groove.

   • which great cut or ditch Sesostris […] purposed to have made a great deale wider and deeper.

   1. An artificial navigation as distinguished from a navigable river
5. A share or portion.

6. (cricket) A batsman's shot played with a swinging motion of the bat, to hit the ball backward of point.
7. (cricket) Sideways movement of the ball through the air caused by a fast bowler imparting spin to the ball.
8. (sports) In lawn tennis, etc., a slanting stroke causing the ball to spin and bound irregularly; also, the spin thus given to the ball.
9. (golf) In a strokeplay competition, the early elimination of those players who have not then attained a preannounced score, so that the rest of the competition is less pressed for time and more entertaining for spectators.
10. (theater) A passage omitted or to be omitted from a play.

11. (film) A particular version or edit of a film.
12. (card games) The act or right of dividing a deck of playing cards.

13. (card games) The card obtained by dividing the pack.
14. The manner or style a garment etc. is fashioned in.
15. A slab, especially of meat.

16. (fencing) An attack made with a chopping motion of the blade, landing with its edge or point.
17. A deliberate snub, typically a refusal to return a bow or other acknowledgement of acquaintance.
    • 1819, Washington Irving, (Rip Van Winkle):

      Rip called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed on. This was an unkind cut indeed.

18. An unkind act; a cruelty.
19. A definable part, such as an individual song, of a recording, particularly of commercial records, audio tapes, CDs, etc.

20. (archaeology) A truncation, a context that represents a moment in time when other archaeological deposits were removed for the creation of some feature such as a ditch or pit.
21. A haircut.
22. (graph theory) The partition of a graph’s vertices into two subgroups.
23. (rail transport) A string of railway cars coupled together, shorter than a train.
24. An engraved block or plate; the impression from such an engraving.

25. (obsolete) A common workhorse; a gelding.
26. (slang, dated) The failure of a college officer or student to be present at any appointed exercise.
27. A skein of yarn.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Wright to this entry?)

28. (slang, uncountable) That which is used to dilute or adulterate a recreational drug.

29. (fashion) A notch shaved into an eyebrow.
30. (bodybuilding) A time period when one tries to lose fat while retaining muscle mass.
31. (slang) A hidden or secure place.

Derived terms

Translations

Interjection

cut!

1. (film and television) An instruction to cease recording.

   Antonym: action

Anagrams

• TUC, UCT, UTC

Irish

Noun

cut m (genitive singular cuit, nominative plural cuit)

1. Cois Fharraige form of cat (“cat”)

Declension

Mutation

Further reading

• "cut" in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, An Gúm, 1977, by Niall Ó Dónaill.

Kiput

Etymology

From Proto-North Sarawak *likud, from Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *likud.

Noun

cut

1. back (the rear of body)

Lower Sorbian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /t?sut/

Verb

cut

1. supine of cu?

Welsh

Pronunciation

• (North Wales) IPA^(key): /k??t/
• (South Wales) IPA^(key): /k?t/

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Middle English [Term?], from Old Northern French cot, cote (“hut, cottage”).

Noun

cut m (plural cutiau)

1. hut, shed; cottage, hovel; pen, coop; cage

Derived terms

Etymology 2

Noun

cut m (plural cutiaid)

1. Alternative form of cud (“kite”)

Mutation

References

• R. J. Thomas, G. A. Bevan, P. J. Donovan, A. Hawke et al., editors (1950–present) , “cut”, in Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru Online (in Welsh), University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??t/
• Rhymes: -?t

Etymology 1

From Middle English shutten, shetten, from Old English scyttan (“to cause rapid movement, shoot a bolt, shut, bolt, shut to, discharge a debt, pay off”), from Proto-Germanic *skutjan?, *skuttijan? (“to bar, bolt”), from Proto-Germanic *skutt?, *skuttj? (“bar, bolt, shed”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewd- (“to drive, fall upon, rush”). Cognate with Dutch schutten (“to shut in, lock up”), Low German schütten (“to shut, lock in”), German schützen (“to shut out, dam, protect, guard”).

Verb

shut (third-person singular simple present shuts, present participle shutting, simple past and past participle shut)

1. (transitive) To close, to stop from being open.

2. (intransitive) To close, to stop being open.

3. (transitive or intransitive, chiefly Britain) To close a business temporarily, or (of a business) to be closed.

4. (transitive) To confine in an enclosed area.

5. (transitive) To catch or snag in the act of shutting something.

6. To preclude; to exclude; to bar out.

   • shut from every shore

Usage notes

Except when part of one of the derived terms listed below, almost every use of shut can be replaced by close. The reverse is not true -- there are many uses of close that cannot be replaced by shut.

Derived terms

Translations

Adjective

shut (not comparable)

1. Closed; not open.

2. (linguistics, phonetics) Synonym of close

Translations

Noun

shut (plural shuts)

1. The act or time of shutting; close.
2. A door or cover; a shutter.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Sir Isaac Newton to this entry?)

3. The line or place where two pieces of metal are welded together.

Etymology 2

Variation of chute or shute (archaic, related to shoot) from Old English sc?otan.

Noun

shut (plural shuts)

1. (Britain, Shropshire dialect) A narrow alley or passage acting as a short cut through the buildings between two streets.

Synonyms

• (alleyway): See Thesaurus:alley

Anagrams

• Hust, STHU, Tush, huts, thus, tush