different between matter vs case

English

Etymology

From Middle English matere, mater, from Anglo-Norman matere, materie, from Old French materie, matiere, from Latin materia (“matter, stuff, material”), derivative of Latin mater (“mother”). Doublet of Madeira.

Displaced native Middle English andweorc, andwork (“material, matter”) (from Old English andweorc (“matter, substance, material”)), Old English intinga (“matter, affair, business”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?mæt?/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?mæt?/, [?mæ??]
  • Homophone: madder
• Rhymes: -æt?(?)
• Hyphenation: mat?ter

Noun

matter (countable and uncountable, plural matters)

1. Substance, material.
   1. (physics) The basic structural component of the universe. Matter usually has mass and volume.
   2. (physics) Matter made up of normal particles, not antiparticles.

      Antonym: antimatter

   3. A kind of substance.

   4. Printed material, especially in books or magazines.

   5. (philosophy) Aristotelian: undeveloped potentiality subject to change and development; formlessness. Matter receives form, and becomes substance.
2. A condition, subject or affair, especially one of concern.
   • 1597, Francis Bacon, Of the Colours of Good and Evil

     if the matter should be tried by duel

   • 12 July 2012, Sam Adams, AV Club Ice Age: Continental Drift

     The matter of whether the world needs a fourth Ice Age movie pales beside the question of why there were three before it, but Continental Drift feels less like an extension of a theatrical franchise than an episode of a middling TV cartoon, lolling around on territory that’s already been settled.

3. An approximate amount or extent.
4. (obsolete) The essence; the pith; the embodiment.
   • 1611, Ben Jonson, Oberon, the Faery Prince

     He is the matter of virtue.

5. (obsolete) Inducing cause or reason, especially of anything disagreeable or distressing.
6. (dated) Pus.

Synonyms

• material
• stuff
• substance

Derived terms

Related terms

• dark matter

Translations

Verb

matter (third-person singular simple present matters, present participle mattering, simple past and past participle mattered)

1. (intransitive) To be important. [from 16th c.]
2. (transitive, in negative constructions, now England regional, Caribbean) To care about, to mind; to find important. [from 17th c.]
   • , Folio Society 1973, p.47:

     Besides, if it had been out of doors I had not mattered it so much; but with my own servant, in my own house, under my own roof […]

   • 1748, Samuel Richardson, Clarissa, Letter 56:

     He matter'd not that, he said; coy maids made the fondest wives […].

3. (intransitive, medicine, archaic) To form pus or matter, as an abscess; to maturate.

   • Each slight sore mattereth.

Derived terms

• it doesn't matter
• no matter (“in spite of”)

Synonyms

• (be important): signify

Translations

French

Verb

matter

1. Alternative spelling of mater

Conjugation

Anagrams

• mettra

German

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?mat?/

Adjective

matter

1. comparative degree of matt
2. inflection of matt:
   1. strong/mixed nominative masculine singular
   2. strong genitive/dative feminine singular
   3. strong genitive plural

Middle French

Alternative forms

• mater

Verb

matter

1. to checkmate

Conjugation

• Middle French conjugation varies from one text to another. Hence, the following conjugation should be considered as typical, not as exhaustive.

Norwegian Bokmål

Noun

matter m pl or f pl

1. indefinite plural of matte (Etymology 1)

Norwegian Nynorsk

Noun

matter f pl

1. indefinite plural of matte (Etymology 1)

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ke?s/
• Rhymes: -e?s
• Hyphenation: case

Etymology 1

Middle English cas, from Old French cas (“an event”), from Latin c?sus (“a falling, a fall; accident, event, occurrence; occasion, opportunity; noun case”), perfect passive participle of cad? (“to fall, to drop”).

Noun

case (plural cases)

1. An actual event, situation, or fact.
2. (now rare) A given condition or state.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.10:

     Ne wist he how to turne, nor to what place: / Was never wretched man in such a wofull cace.

   • 1726, Nathan Bailey, John Worlidge, Dictionarium Rusticum, Urbanicum & Botanicum

     Mares which are over-fat, hold with much difficulty; whereas those that are but in good case and plump, conceive with the greatest readiness and ease.

3. A piece of work, specifically defined within a profession.
4. (academia) An instance or event as a topic of study.
6. (law) A legal proceeding, lawsuit.
7. (grammar) A specific inflection of a word depending on its function in the sentence.

   • Now, the Subject of either an indicative or a subjunctive Clause is always assigned Nominative case, as we see from:
     (16) (a) ? I know [that they/*them/*their leave for Hawaii tomorrow]
     (16) (b) ? I demand [that they/*them/*their leave for Hawaii tomorrow]
     By contrast, the Subject of an infinitive Clause is assigned Objective case, as we see from:
     (17) ? I want [them/*they/*their to leave for Hawaii tomorrow]
     And the Subject of a gerund Clause is assigned either Objective or Genitive case: cf.
     (18) ? I don't like the idea of [them/their/*they leaving for Hawaii tomorrow]

8. (grammar, uncountable) Grammatical cases and their meanings taken either as a topic in general or within a specific language.

9. (medicine) An instance of a specific condition or set of symptoms.

10. (programming) A section of code representing one of the actions of a conditional switch.

Synonyms

Hyponyms

• court case
• See also Thesaurus:grammatical case

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

case (third-person singular simple present cases, present participle casing, simple past and past participle cased)

1. (obsolete) to propose hypothetical cases

See also

• Appendix:Grammatical cases

References

• case on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Etymology 2

From Middle English cas, from Old Northern French casse, (compare Old French chasse (“box, chest, case”)), from Latin capsa (“box, bookcase”), from capi? (“to take, seize, hold”). Doublet of cash.

Noun

case (plural cases)

2. A box that contains or can contain a number of identical items of manufacture.
3. A box, sheath, or covering generally.

4. A piece of luggage that can be used to transport an apparatus such as a sewing machine.
5. An enclosing frame or casing.

6. A suitcase.
7. A piece of furniture, constructed partially of transparent glass or plastic, within which items can be displayed.
8. The outer covering or framework of a piece of apparatus such as a computer.
9. (printing, historical) A shallow tray divided into compartments or "boxes" for holding type, traditionally arranged in sets of two, the "upper case" (containing capitals, small capitals, accented) and "lower case" (small letters, figures, punctuation marks, quadrats, and spaces).
10. (typography, by extension) The nature of a piece of alphabetic type, whether a “capital” (upper case) or “small” (lower case) letter.
11. (poker slang) Four of a kind.
12. (US) A unit of liquid measure used to measure sales in the beverage industry, equivalent to 192 fluid ounces.
13. (mining) A small fissure which admits water into the workings.

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

14. A thin layer of harder metal on the surface of an object whose deeper metal is allowed to remain soft.
15. A cardboard box that holds (usually 24) beer bottles or cans.

    Synonym: carton

Hyponyms

Translations

References

• Weisenberg, Michael (2000) The Official Dictionary of Poker. MGI/Mike Caro University. ?ISBN

Adjective

case (not comparable)

1. (poker slang) The last remaining card of a particular rank.
   • 2006, David Apostolico, Lessons from the Professional Poker Tour (page 21)

     If he did have a bigger ace, I still had at least six outs — the case ace, two nines, and three tens. I could also have more outs if he held anything less than A-K.

References

• Weisenberg, Michael (2000) The Official Dictionary of Poker. MGI/Mike Caro University. ?ISBN

Verb

case (third-person singular simple present cases, present participle casing, simple past and past participle cased)

1. (transitive) To place (an item or items of manufacture) into a box, as in preparation for shipment.
2. (transitive) To cover or protect with, or as if with, a case; to enclose.
   • 1856-1858, William H. Prescott, History of the Reign of Philip II

     The man who, cased in steel, had passed whole days and nights in the saddle.

3. (transitive, informal) To survey (a building or other location) surreptitiously, as in preparation for a robbery.
   • 1977, Michael Innes, The Gay Phoenix, ?ISBN, page 116:

     You are in the grounds of Brockholes Abbey, a house into which a great deal of valuable property has just been moved. And your job is to case the joint for a break in.

   • 2014, Amy Goodman, From COINTELPRO to Snowden, the FBI Burglars Speak Out After 43 Years of Silence (Part 2), Democracy Now!, January 8, 2014, 0:49 to 0:57:

     Bonnie worked as a daycare director. She helped case the FBI office by posing as a college student interested in becoming an FBI agent.

Translations

Derived terms

• case the deck

Anagrams

• ACEs, ASCE, Aces, Ceas, ESCA, SCEA, aces, aesc, esca, æsc

Afar

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /???se/

Verb

casé

1. (transitive) hit

Conjugation

References

• Mohamed Hassan Kamil (2015) L’afar: description grammaticale d’une langue couchitique (Djibouti, Erythrée et Ethiopie)?^[2], Paris: Université Sorbonne Paris Cité (doctoral thesis), page 263

Asturian

Verb

case

1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive of casar

Chinese

Alternative forms

• K?

Etymology

Borrowed from English case.

Pronunciation

Noun

case

1. (Hong Kong Cantonese) case (clarification of this definition is needed)
   • 2015, ???, ????????? II??????????

     ????case???????????????case?? [Cantonese, trad.]
     ????case???????????????case?? [Cantonese, simp.]

     ni¹ go³ hou² do¹ kei¹ si² gaa³. ni¹ jat¹ go³, zau⁶ hai⁶ zoeng¹ gwok³ wing⁴, jau⁵ gam² go³ kei¹ si² laa¹. [Jyutping]

     That kind of case happens often. It happened with Leslie Cheung.

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin casa, in the sense of "hut, cabin". The other senses are a semantic loan from Spanish casa. Doublet of chez, which was inherited.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /k?z/
• Homophone: cases

Noun

case f (plural cases)

1. (archaic, rare or regional) hut, cabin, shack
2. box (on form)
3. square (on board game)

Derived terms

• case départ
• case à cocher

Further reading

• “case” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• à sec

Galician

Alternative forms

• caixe

Etymology

Attested since the 15th century (quasy), from Latin quasi (“as if”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?k?s?]

Adverb

case

1. almost

References

• “quasy” in Xavier Varela Barreiro & Xavier Gómez Guinovart: Corpus Xelmírez - Corpus lingüístico da Galicia medieval. SLI / Grupo TALG / ILG, 2006-2016.
• “case” in Dicionario de Dicionarios da lingua galega, SLI - ILGA 2006-2013.
• “case” in Tesouro informatizado da lingua galega. Santiago: ILG.
• “case” in Álvarez, Rosario (coord.): Tesouro do léxico patrimonial galego e portugués, Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega.

Italian

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: ca?se

Noun

case f

1. plural of casa

Anagrams

• asce, esca, seca

Lower Sorbian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?t?sas?/, [?t?sas?]

Noun

case

1. nominative/accusative plural of cas

Middle Dutch

Etymology

From Old Dutch *k?si, from late Proto-West Germanic *k?s?, borrowed from Latin c?seus.

Noun

câse m or n

1. cheese

Inflection

This noun needs an inflection-table template.

Alternative forms

• kese (eastern)

Descendants

• Dutch: kaas
  • Afrikaans: kaas
    • ? Sotho: kase
    • ? Tswana: kase
  • ? Papiamentu: keshi (from the diminutive)
  • ? Sranan Tongo: kasi
• Limburgish: kieës, kees

Further reading

• “case”, in Vroegmiddelnederlands Woordenboek, 2000
• Verwijs, E.; Verdam, J. (1885–1929) , “case (I)”, in Middelnederlandsch Woordenboek, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, ?ISBN, page I

Old French

Noun

case m (oblique plural cases, nominative singular cases, nominative plural case)

1. (grammar) case

Portuguese

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: ca?se
• Rhymes: -azi

Verb

case

1. first-person singular (eu) present subjunctive of casar
2. third-person singular (ele and ela, also used with você and others) present subjunctive of casar
3. third-person singular (você) affirmative imperative of casar
4. third-person singular (você) negative imperative of casar

Romanian

Noun

case

1. plural of cas?

Spanish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?kase/, [?ka.se]

Verb

case

1. Formal second-person singular (usted) imperative form of casar.
2. First-person singular (yo) present subjunctive form of casar.
3. Formal second-person singular (usted) present subjunctive form of casar.
4. Third-person singular (él, ella, also used with usted^?) present subjunctive form of casar.

Venetian

Noun

case

1. plural of casa