club

Less common meanings

6. 6
   heavy sticknouncountable

   A heavy stick or similar object made for striking, whether as a weapon or as a toy.

   Ancient warriors fought with clubs carved from hardwood.

   The watchman gripped his club as he heard footsteps in the alley.

   Similarcudgel, bludgeon, truncheon, baton, stick

   Note

   A club is heavy and blunt, and it shades easily into the harmless kind, such as the Indian clubs unpacked from packing-cases in W. B. Maxwell's The Mirror and the Lamp (1918). Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 3 facts

   • W. B. Maxwell wrote The Mirror and the Lamp. openlibrary.org
   • The Mirror and the Lamp was first published in 1918. en.wikisource.org
   • The novel describes Indian clubs emerging from packing-cases. en.wiktionary.org
7. 7
   verbtransitive

   To strike someone or something with a club.

   Hunters sometimes club their prey rather than shoot it.

   The mob clubbed the man before police arrived.

   UsageDoubles the b, clubbed, clubbing; a common phrase is clubbed to death.

   Similarbludgeon, beat, batter, cudgel, bash

   Note

   In Jack London's The Sea-Wolf (1904), the narrator resolves to "club the seals" after hearing sealers talk about clubbing them. Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

   • Jack London wrote The Sea-Wolf, first published in 1904. exhibits.usu.edu
   • The narrator says he must club the seals and reports having heard sealers discuss clubbing them. gutenberg.org
8. 8
   nouncountable

   One of the four suits in a deck of playing cards, marked with a black clover-shaped symbol (♣), or a card of this suit.

   Leading a high club forced out the opponent's trump.

   He discarded two low clubs early in the game.

   UsageThe suit is plural, the queen of clubs, and a club is one card of it.

9. 9
   sandwichnouncountable

   A sandwich of several stacked layers, typically including meat, lettuce, tomato, and toasted bread.

   He cut the club into four triangles and ate the first one.

   The café's turkey club is stacked high with bacon and avocado.

   UsageThe filling goes first: a turkey club, a chicken club.

   Note

   A clipping of club sandwich. Menus use it plainly; Joanne M. Anderson's Small-town Restaurants in Virginia lists "chicken clubs" beside tuna melts and crab cake sandwiches. Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

   • Club is a shortened form of club sandwich. en.wiktionary.org
   • The book lists chicken clubs alongside tuna melts and crab cake sandwiches. en.wiktionary.org
10. 10
    win easilyverbtransitive

    To defeat an opponent by a wide margin.

    The champions clubbed their rivals in the final.

    Top seeds often club lower-ranked opponents early in the tournament.

    Similarthrash, trounce, crush, rout, hammer

    Note

    Sports reporting uses the verb for a lopsided win, often with the scoreline attached: Ashleigh Barty "clubbed China's Yafan Wang 6-2, 6-3" at the 2019 Australian Open. It borrows the force of striking with a club, so the loser is beaten down rather than merely beaten. Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

    • Ashleigh Barty defeated Yafan Wang 6-2, 6-3 at the 2019 Australian Open. ausopen.com
    • The match report uses the quoted wording and identifies Wang as Chinese. theguardian.com
11. 11
    gymnasticsnouncountable

    A bottle-shaped piece of apparatus used in pairs during rhythmic gymnastics routines.

    The gymnast tossed one club high and caught it behind her back.

    Each athlete performs with two matched clubs during the apparatus segment.

    UsageUsually plural, since a gymnast performs with clubs, one in each hand.

    Note

    Rhythmic gymnastics treats the clubs as one apparatus made of two pieces. The bottle-shaped pieces are swung, circled and thrown in coordinated patterns, and they are one of the five apparatus recognized in competition. Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 3 facts

    • The clubs have a bottle-like shape. activesgcircle.gov.sg
    • Clubs routines involve coordinated swings, circles and throws. worldgymnastics.sport
    • Clubs are one of five apparatus types recognized in rhythmic gymnastics. en.wikipedia.org
12. 12
    verbintransitive

    To combine money or effort with other people, each giving a share, to pay for or achieve something together, as in 'we clubbed together to buy her a present'.

    The students club together to cover the cost of the bus.

    The three roommates clubbed together to pay for a new couch.

    UsageUsually club together, then to + verb or for: club together to buy a gift.

    Note

    The verb that goes with a share of the bill: to club is to put in your part. In Jonathan Swift's Death and Daphne, written in 1730, the owl, the raven and the bat "Clubb'd for a feather to his hat."

13. 13
    nounarchaiccountable

    A person's share of a common expense, or money paid into a shared fund, including membership dues.

    They laid down the Club.

    1692, Roger L’Estrange, Fables

    17 Mat 1660, Samuel Pepys, diary first we went and dined at a French house , but paid 10s for our part of the club

    Note

    Seventeenth-century diners used it for the bill they split among themselves. Samuel Pepys, dining at a French house in 1660, recorded a payment "for our part of the club," and Roger L'Estrange in 1692 has a couple who "laid down their Club" for what they drank. You paid your part of it or laid it down, much as one now settles a reckoning. The verb paying an equal share is the same idea put into action. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 5 facts

    • Seventeenth-century diners used 'club' for a shared dining expense. gutenberg.org
    • Pepys recorded dining at a French house in 1660 and used the words 'for our part of the club'. en.wikisource.org
    • L'Estrange's Fables was published in 1692. en.wikisource.org
    • The passage describes a couple who sold ale; its wording is 'They laid down their Club still for what they had'. gutenberg.org
    • Paying one's club meant contributing a share of an expense. en.wiktionary.org
14. 14
    turn gun aroundverbtransitive

    To turn a musket breech-upward so as to wield it as a bludgeon.

    Surrounded and unable to reload, he clubbed his musket and struck out.

    The infantry would club their muskets once the lines collided.

    Note

    A battle verb from the age of the musket. When there was no time to reload, a soldier turned the weapon breech-up and swung its heavy end as a bludgeon. The object is the gun itself, as in "he clubbed his musket," so the phrase turns a firearm back into the plain cudgel. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 3 facts

    • Clubbed muskets were used in historical battles. nps.gov
    • Soldiers could resort to clubbing their muskets when there was insufficient time to reload. earlofmanchesters.wordpress.com
    • To club a musket means to turn its breech uppermost for use as a club. en.wiktionary.org
15. 15
    verbdated

    To come together with others to form a group.

    Till grosser atoms, tumbling in the stream / Of fancy, madly met, and clubb'd into a dream.

    1687, [John Dryden], The Hind and the Panther
16. 16
    verbrare

    To gather or form into a mass shaped like a club.
17. 17
    nounrare

    The middle slice of bread that separates the two layers of filling in a club sandwich.
18. 18
    nounslang

    The propeller of an airplane.
19. 19
    verbarchaic

    To throw troops into confusion, or let them fall into disorder.

    To club a battalion implies a temporary inability in the commanding officer to restore any given body of men to their natural front in line or column.

    1876, Major-General G. E. Voyle; Captain G. De Saint-Clair-Stevenson, F.R.G.S.
20. 20
    verbarchaic

    To drift in a current while the anchor trails along the bottom.