different between song vs lay

English

Etymology

From Middle English song, sang, from Old English song, sang (“noise, song, singing, chanting; poetry; a poem to be sung or recited, psalm, lay”), from Proto-Germanic *sangwaz (“singing, song”), from Proto-Indo-European *seng??- (“to sing”). Cognate with Scots sang, song (“singing, song”), Saterland Frisian Song (“song”), West Frisian sang (“song”), Dutch zang (“song”), Low German sang (“song”), German Sang (“singing, song”), Swedish sång (“song”), Norwegian Bokmål sang (“song”), Norwegian Nynorsk song (“song”), Icelandic söngur (“song”), Ancient Greek ???? (omph?, “voice, oracle”). More at sing.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /s??/
• (US) IPA^(key): /s??/, /s??/
• Rhymes: -??

Noun

song (plural songs)

1. A musical composition with lyrics for voice or voices, performed by singing.
2. (by extension) Any musical composition.
3. Poetical composition; poetry; verse.
   • The bard that first adorned our native tongue / Tuned to his British lyre this ancient song.

4. The act or art of singing.
5. A melodious sound made by a bird, insect, whale or other animal.
   • 1833, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Canterbury Pilgrims

     That most ethereal of all sounds, the song of crickets.
6. (ornithology) The distinctive sound that a male bird utters to attract a mate or to protect his territory; contrasts with call; also, similar vocalisations made by female birds.
7. A low price, especially one under the expected value; chiefly in for a song.
   • 1810, Benjamin Silliman, A Journal of Travels in England, Holland and Scotland

     his [a common soldier's] pay is a song.

   • Thus the red damask curtains which now shut out the fog-laden, drizzling atmosphere of the Marylebone Road, had cost a mere song, and yet they might have been warranted to last another thirty years. A great bargain also had been the excellent Axminster carpet which covered the floor; […].

8. An object of derision; a laughing stock.

   • And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• canticle
• go for a song

Anagrams

• NGOs, NGSO, Ngos, gons, nogs, snog

Atong (India)

Etymology

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

Noun

song

1. village

Derived terms

References

• van Breugel, Seino. 2015. Atong-English dictionary, second edition. Available online: https://www.academia.edu/487044/Atong_English_Dictionary.

Bikol Central

Noun

song

1. rhinoceros beetle

Chuukese

Adjective

song

1. angry

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from English song. Doublet of zang.

Pronunciation

Noun

song m (plural songs)

1. song

   Synonyms: lied, liedje

Derived terms

Faroese

Etymology

From Old Norse sæing (“bed”), later sæng.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /s??k/

Noun

song f (genitive singular songar or seingjar, plural seingir or sengur)

1. bed

Declension

See also

• kamar
• sovikamar
• svøvnposi
• svøvnur
• koddi

Garo

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

song

1. village, hamlet
2. classifier for villages

Derived terms

• songjinma
• songsal

Mandarin

Romanization

song

1. Nonstandard spelling of s?ng.
2. Nonstandard spelling of s?ng.
3. Nonstandard spelling of sòng.

Usage notes

• English transcriptions of Mandarin speech often fail to distinguish between the critical tonal differences employed in the Mandarin language, using words such as this one without the appropriate indication of tone.

Middle English

Alternative forms

• sange, sang, songe, zang, zong, zonge, soong, songge

Etymology

From Old English sang, song, from Proto-Germanic *sangwaz.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /s?n?/, /s??n?/, /san?/, /sa?n?/

Noun

song (plural songes)

1. A song (lyrical music):
   1. Religious or spiritual chanting or hymns.
   2. A exposition or story, especially a sung one.
   3. A song supposed to have occult or magical power.
2. The practice or an instance of singing songs.
3. The sound produced by a bird (rarely other creatures)
4. A tune; non-lyrical music.
5. A quip, declaration, or remark.
6. A poem; a written work in verse.

Declension

Derived terms

• songly

Descendants

• English: song
• Scots: song, sang

References

• “s??ng, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-10-24.

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From Old Norse s?ngr. Akin to English song.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /s???/

Noun

song m (definite singular songen, indefinite plural songar, definite plural songane)

1. song

Derived terms

Verb

song

1. past tense of syngja, syngje, synga and synge

References

• “song” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

Tok Pisin

Etymology

From English song.

Noun

song

1. song

Vietnamese

Pronunciation

• (Hà N?i) IPA^(key): [saw??m??]
• (Hu?) IPA^(key): [?aw??m??]
• (H? Chí Minh City) IPA^(key): [?aw??m??] ~ [saw??m??]
• Homophone: xong

Etymology 1

Noun

(classifier cây) song • (????, ????, ????)

1. big rattan

Etymology 2

Sino-Vietnamese word from ? (“window”).

Noun

song

1. (archaic, literary) window
2. Short for ch?n song (“upright post in a paling or railing”).

Derived terms

Etymology 3

Sino-Vietnamese word from ? (“double; pair”).

Prefix

song

1. bi-; double; parallel

Derived terms

Adverb

song

1. (formal) however
2. (formal) but

Derived terms

Zhuang

Etymology

From Proto-Tai *so???, from Middle Chinese ? (MC ????, “two”). Cognate with Thai ??? (s???ng), Northern Thai ???, Lao ??? (s?ng), Lü ??? (?oang), Tai Dam ???, Shan ???? (s?ang), Tai Nüa ???? (sóang), Ahom ???????????????? (song), Bouyei soongl.

Pronunciation

• (Standard Zhuang) IPA^(key): /?o????/
• Tone numbers: song¹
• Hyphenation: song

Numeral

song (Sawndip forms ? or ? or ?, old orthography so?)

1. two
   • 2008, Rint Sybesma, Zhuang: A Tai language with some Sinitic characteristics, in From Linguistic Areas to Areal Linguistics (edited by Pieter Muysken), page 246:

     De   fwngz   ndeu   yaeuj   ndaej   song   doengj   raemx   bae!

     3s    hand    one     raise    ACQ    two    bucket    water    PRT

     S/he can lift two buckets of water with one hand!

Usage notes

Used with ndeu rather than it.

Synonyms

• ngeih

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: l?, IPA^(key): /le?/
• Rhymes: -e?
• Homophones: lei, ley, le

Etymology 1

From Middle English leyen, leggen, from Old English le??an (“to lay”), from Proto-West Germanic *laggjan, from Proto-Germanic *lagjan? (“to lay”), causative form of Proto-Germanic *ligjan? (“to lie, recline”), from Proto-Indo-European *leg?- (“to lie, recline”).

Cognate with West Frisian lizze (“to lay, to lie”), Dutch leggen (“to lay”), German legen (“to lay”), Norwegian Bokmål legge (“to lay”), Norwegian Nynorsk leggja (“to lay”), Swedish lägga (“to lay”), Icelandic leggja (“to lay”), Albanian lag (“troop, band, war encampment”).

Verb

lay (third-person singular simple present lays, present participle laying, simple past and past participle laid)

1. (transitive) To place down in a position of rest, or in a horizontal position.
   • 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’.

2. (transitive, archaic) To cause to subside or abate.

   Synonyms: becalm, settle down
3. (transitive) To prepare (a plan, project etc.); to set out, establish (a law, principle).
4. (transitive) To install certain building materials, laying one thing on top of another.

5. (transitive) To produce and deposit an egg.

6. (transitive) To bet (that something is or is not the case).

7. (transitive) To deposit (a stake) as a wager; to stake; to risk.
8. (transitive, slang) To have sex with.

   Synonyms: lie by, lie with, sleep with; see also Thesaurus:copulate with
9. (nautical) To take a position; to come or go.

10. (law) To state; to allege.

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

11. (military) To point; to aim.

12. (ropemaking) To put the strands of (a rope, a cable, etc.) in their proper places and twist or unite them.

13. (printing) To place and arrange (pages) for a form upon the imposing stone.
14. (printing) To place (new type) properly in the cases.
15. To apply; to put.
16. To impose (a burden, punishment, command, tax, etc.).
17. To impute; to charge; to allege.

    Synonyms: ascribe, attribute
18. To present or offer.

Conjugation

Usage notes

• The verb lay is sometimes used instead of the corresponding intransitive verb lie in informal settings, especially but not exclusively in spoken language. Similarly, laid, the past tense and perfect participle of lay, may also replace lay and lain, respectively the past tense and perfect participle of lie.
• This intransitive use dates to Middle English, first appearing in the thirteenth century but only becoming common in the fifteenth century. The usage was still chiefly limited to the present tense and it seems that it was influenced by reflexive or passive use of lay.
• There are several factors that contribute to the loss of the distinction. One is that lay is used as both the base form of lay and as the past tense of lie, another is the use of lay as a reflexive verb meaning “to go lie (down)”. In any event, similar mergers exist in other Germanic languages; compare Afrikaans lê (“to lie; to lay”), where the two verbs have merged completely.
• Traditional grammars, schoolbooks and style guides object to this intransitive use of lay and a certain stigma remains against the practice. Consequently the usage is common in speech but rarely found in edited writing or in more formal spoken situations.
• Nautical use of lay as an intransitive verb is regarded as standard.

Derived terms

Translations

Further reading

• John A. Simpson and Edward S. C. Weiner, editors (1989) , “lay”, in The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, ?ISBN

Noun

lay (countable and uncountable, plural lays)

1. Arrangement or relationship; layout.

   the lay of the land

2. A share of the profits in a business.
   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick, chapter 16

     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.

3. A lyrical, narrative poem written in octosyllabic couplets that often deals with tales of adventure and romance.
   • 1945: "The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun" by JRR Tolkien

     Sad is the note and sad the lay,
     but mirth we meet not every day.

4. The direction a rope is twisted.

   Worm and parcel with the lay; turn and serve the other way.

5. (colloquial) A casual sexual partner.
   • 1996, JoAnn Ross, Southern Comforts, MIRA (1996), ?ISBN, page 166:

     Over the years she'd tried to tell himself that his uptown girl was just another lay.

   • 2000, R. J. Kaiser, Fruitcake, MIRA (2000), ?ISBN, page 288:

     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.

   • 2011, Kelly Meding, Trance, Pocket Books (2011), ?ISBN, pages 205-206:

     “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. […]

   What was I, just another lay you can toss aside as you go on to your next conquest?

6. (colloquial) An act of sexual intercourse.
   • 1993, David Halberstam, The Fifties, Open Road Integrated Media (2012), ?ISBN, unnumbered page:

     Listening to this dismissal of his work, [Tennessee] Williams thought to himself of Wilder, “This character has never had a good lay.”

   • 2009, Fern Michaels, The Scoop, Kensington Books (2009), ?ISBN, pages 212-213:

     […] 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.

   • 2011, Pamela Yaye, Promises We Make, Kimani Press (2011), ?ISBN, unnumbered page:

     “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—”

7. (slang, archaic) A plan; a scheme.

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

8. (uncountable) the laying of eggs.

   The hens are off the lay at present.

9. (obsolete) A layer.
   • 1677, Hannah Woolley, The Compleat Servant-Maid, London: T. Passinger, p. 5,^[1]

     […] 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 […]

   • 1718, Joseph Addison, Remarks on Several Parts of Italy, &c. in the Years 1701, 1702, 1703, London: J. Tonson, “Sienna, Leghorne, Pisa,” p. 300,^[2]

     […] the whole Body of the Church is chequer’d with different Lays of White and Black Marble […]

   • 1724, Thomas Spooner, A Compendious Treatise of the Diseases of the Skin, London, Chapter 2, p. 20,^[3]

     […] 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 […]

   • 1766, Thomas Amory, The Life of John Buncle, Esq., London: J. Johnson and B. Davenport, Volume 2, Section 1, p. 16, footnote 1,^[4]

     […] 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 […]

Synonyms

• (casual sexual partner): see also Thesaurus:casual sexual partner.

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English laie, lawe, from Old English lagu (“sea, flood, water, ocean”), from Proto-West Germanic *lagu (“water, sea”), from Proto-Germanic *laguz (“water, sea”), from Proto-Indo-European *lakw- (“water, body of water, lake”). Cognate with Icelandic lögur (“liquid, fluid, lake”), Latin lacus (“lake, hollow, hole”).

Noun

lay (plural lays)

1. A lake.

Etymology 3

From Old French lai, from Latin laicus, from Ancient Greek ?????? (laïkós). Doublet of laic.

Adjective

lay (comparative more lay, superlative most lay)

1. Not belonging to the clergy, but associated with them.

   They seemed more lay than clerical.

   a lay preacher; a lay brother

2. Non-professional; not being a member of an organized institution.
3. (card games) Not trumps.

   a lay suit

4. (obsolete) Not educated or cultivated; ignorant.

Related terms

Translations

Etymology 4

See lie.

Verb

lay

1. simple past tense of lie when pertaining to position.

   The baby lay in its crib and slept silently.

2. (proscribed) To be in a horizontal position; to lie (from confusion with lie).
   • 1969 July, Bob Dylan, “Lay Lady Lay”, Nashville Skyline, Columbia:

     Lay, lady, lay. / Lay across my big brass bed.

   • 1974, John Denver, “Annie’s Song”, Back Home Again, RCA:

     Let me lay down beside you. / Let me always be with you.

Derived terms

• layabout

Etymology 5

From Middle English lay, from Old French lai (“song, lyric, poem”), from Frankish *laih (“play, melody, song”), from Proto-Germanic *laikaz, *laikiz (“jump, play, dance, hymn”), from Proto-Indo-European *loyg-, *lay?- (“to jump, spring, play”). Akin to Old High German leih (“a play, skit, melody, song”), Middle High German leich (“piece of music, epic song played on a harp”), Old English l?can (“to move quickly, fence, sing”). See lake.

Noun

lay (plural lays)

1. A ballad or sung poem; a short poem or narrative, usually intended to be sung.
   • 1742, Edward Young, The Complaint: or Night-Thoughts on Life, Death & Immortality, Night I

     I strive, with wakeful melody, to cheer

     The sullen gloom, sweet Philomel! like thee,

     And call the stars to listen: every star

     Is deaf to mine, enamour’d of thy lay.

   • 1805 The Lay of the Last Minstrel, Sir Walter Scott.

Translations

Etymology 6

See lea

Noun

lay (plural lays)

1. (obsolete) A meadow; a lea.

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

Etymology 7

Noun

lay (plural lays)

1. (obsolete) A law.
2. (obsolete) An obligation; a vow.

   • they bound themselues by a sacred lay and oth to fight it out to the last man

Etymology 8

Calque of Yiddish ?????? (leygn, “to put, lay”).

Verb

lay (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)).

References

Anagrams

• Aly

Anguthimri

Verb

lay

1. (transitive, Mpakwithi) to carry

References

• Terry Crowley, The Mpakwithi dialect of Anguthimri (1981), page 186

Haitian Creole

Etymology

From French l'ail (“the garlic”)

Noun

lay

1. garlic

Lashi

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /la??/

Postposition

lay

1. through
2. across

Verb

lay

1. to pass

References

• Hkaw Luk (2017) A grammatical sketch of Lacid?^[5], Chiang Mai: Payap University (master thesis)

Malagasy

Etymology

From Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *laya?, from Proto-Austronesian *laya?.

Noun

lay

1. sail (a piece of fabric attached to a boat)
2. tent

References

• lay in Malagasy dictionaries at malagasyword.org

Mauritian Creole

Etymology 1

From French ail

Noun

lay

1. garlic

Etymology 2

From Malagasy ley (butterfly)

Noun

lay

1. moth

References

• Baker, Philip & Hookoomsing, Vinesh Y. 1987. Dictionnaire de créole mauricien. Morisyen – English – Français

Middle English

Verb

lay

1. Alternative form of leie: simple past of lien

Seychellois Creole

Etymology 1

From French ail

Noun

lay

1. garlic

Etymology 2

From Malagasy ley (butterfly)

Noun

lay

1. moth

References

• Danielle D’Offay et Guy Lionnet, Diksyonner Kreol - Franse / Dictionnaire Créole Seychellois - Français

Vietnamese

Pronunciation

• (Hà N?i) IPA^(key): [laj??]
• (Hu?) IPA^(key): [laj??]
• (H? Chí Minh City) IPA^(key): [la(?)j??]

Verb

lay

1. to shake

Derived terms