pad
Pluralpads
Pluralpads
- 1A soft bag or cushion that relieves pressure or supports a part of the body.
Cyclists often add a gel pad to ease pressure on long rides.
The brace included foam pads to cushion the joint.
Similarcushion
- 2A block of writing-paper sheets bound at one edge, used for writing on or for blotting.
The detective jotted the address on his pad.
Reporters filled their pads with shorthand notes during the trial.
Similarnotepad, notebook, jotter, tablet
Note
The writing pad started as a cushion, a soft surface to write on or to blot ink with. Later the word settled on the block of paper sheets itself, and that is what it means now. The paper version later gave its name to the cryptographer's key.
- 3
- 4The fleshy, largely hairless cushion on the underside of a paw or of an animal's foot.
A dog grips the slick floor with the bare pad of each paw.
A bear's pads leave broad prints across the muddy bank.
- 5A mass of absorbent material used to absorb menstrual flow.
She changed her pad before the long afternoon meeting.
Many travelers pack extra pads in their carry-on bags.
- 6
- 7
- 8A leaf that lies flat on the water's surface, such as that of a water lily or a similar aquatic plant.
The pond was thick with pads by midsummer.
A turtle pulled itself onto a broad pad to bask in the sun.
Note
An American way of naming the floating leaves: where a pond is crowded with water lilies, the leaves are simply pads. Outside the US the bare word may not call up a pond at all, so lily pad or water-lily leaf is the clearer choice there.
- 9To enlarge or lengthen something, especially by adding filler that serves no real purpose.
The contractor padded the bill with charges for work never done.
Writers sometimes pad a thin argument with needless repetition.
Similarinflate, stretch, fatten, lengthen
Note
Most often this is a charge of dishonesty or dullness: someone pads their expenses, a bill, or a thin story with filler. In headlines the verb turns neutral. When the Austin American-Statesman wrote in 2008 that Obama "pads delegate lead," it meant only that his margin grew. Watch the object: padding a lead is winning, while padding an expense claim is cheating.
- 10In cricket, a padded guard strapped to a batsman's leg to protect it from injury by the ball.
He adjusted his pads as he walked out to the crease.
The ball thudded harmlessly against the batsman's pad.
Note
Cricketers almost always speak of these in the plural: a batsman adjusts his pads before walking out, and the wicketkeeper wears them too. A ball that strikes the pad rather than the bat can bring a leg-before-wicket appeal, so the pad is part of the game's rules as well as its kit. The verb names using it on purpose.
- 11
- 12Ellipsis of keypad.
He keyed the access code into the pad beside the elevator.
The alarm pad beeped twice when she armed the system.
Note
A clipped form of keypad. When the setting makes the keys obvious, as on a door lock, an alarm or a phone, speakers drop key- and simply say pad. The thing named still has buttons, and that separates it from the touch-sensitive panel, a surface that responds to pressure without separate keys.
- 13Ellipsis of mouse pad.
The optical mouse glided smoothly across the new pad.
He rolled up the pad and tucked it into his laptop bag.
Note
Another clipping, this time of mouse pad, the surface a computer mouse glides across. The full compound is labeled American and Australian. The short form works only at a desk where a mouse is in view; elsewhere, a lone pad is more likely to suggest a block of paper.
- 14
- 15A fleshy, cushioned area of the human body, most notably at the tips of the fingers.
He traced the texture with the pad of his index finger.
Calluses formed on the pads of her fingertips after months of climbing.
- 16A cushion-like thickening of skin on the underside of an animal's toes.
The vet found a thorn lodged deep in the dog's rear pad.
Rough, frozen ground can crack the pads on a sled dog's feet.
Note
Here the word is closest to its probable source, a Low German or West Flemish pad meaning "sole of the foot." English first used the word for a straw bed. Because there is a cushion under each toe, a vet or a dog owner usually speaks of pads in the plural.
- 17A bed, in informal or slang use.
He flopped down on his pad and was asleep within minutes.
After the long shift, all she wanted was to hit the pad.
Note
A slang family centered on where you sleep. In American slang a pad is a bed, and more loosely a person's own small home. In British slang it is a prison cell. All of these echo the word's earliest English meaning, a bundle of straw to lie on. Keep it for casual talk, as in hit the pad, and say bed anywhere formal.
- 18A flattened mass of something soft, made to sit or lie on.
He unrolled a foam pad before settling down for the night.
The shelter handed out sleeping pads to everyone who came in.
Note
The oldest meaning on record: in 1554 a pad was a bundle of straw to lie on. The word probably came from Low German or West Flemish pad, "sole of the foot." It may go back further to an Indo-European root meaning "to pass." If so, pad is a distant relative of path and find, and the bedding sense grew from a word for the part of the foot that touches the ground.
- 19
- 20A synthesizer sound used for sustained, atmospheric background layers in music.
The producer layered a lush pad beneath the vocal line.
Ambient tracks often rely on slow, evolving pads for their mood.
Note
A producer's term for the bed of sound nobody hums. A pad usually swells in and fades out slowly, with a slow attack and release, and fills harmonic space beneath the lead and the beat rather than carrying a tune. Its fuller name is synth pad. The held-note idea is shared with the blues reed effect, but this pad comes from a synthesizer.
- 21A stuffed guard or protective covering, especially one worn on a horse's legs to prevent bruising.
The trainer fastened a protective pad to the horse's foreleg.
Polo ponies often need leg pads during fast, hard matches.
Similarguard
- 22A cushion used as a saddle, without the rigid tree or frame of an ordinary saddle.
He preferred a light pad to a heavy stock saddle for short rides.
On the trek, the ponies carried only simple pads and light loads.
- 23An informal term for a tablet computer.
I jotted the notes straight onto my pad during the meeting.
Half the class was sketching on their pads instead of paper.
Similartablet
Note
Slang that borrows the shape of the writing pad: a flat slate you carry around and write or sketch on. In everyday speech it overlaps with branded names such as the iPad. It sits easily in conversation, but tablet is the safe word in anything formal.
- 24In cricket, to deliberately block the ball with the leg pad rather than the bat.
The batsman decided to pad the ball rather than play a risky stroke.
He padded several deliveries outside off stump to frustrate the bowler.
Note
This is a tactic, not an accident: the batsman chooses to pad the ball instead of playing a stroke. It is typically used against deliveries outside the off stump, where offering no shot removes the risk of being caught. The verb takes the ball as its object, as in he padded several deliveries, and it grows directly from the cricket leg guard.
- 25A random key as long as the plaintext, used to encrypt a message, originally written on a disposable pad.
The agent encrypted each dispatch with a fresh pad for every transmission.
Because the pad was used only once, the cipher could not be broken.
Note
Cryptographers kept the stationery in the name. The random key was once written on a paper pad whose sheets were used once and thrown away. This is the principle of the one-time pad: the key is as long as the message and never reused. If the key is also truly random and kept secret, the cipher cannot be broken.
- 26
- 27Used to represent a soft, flat sound, such as that of bare footsteps.
Pad, pad, pad came the sound of someone creeping down the hall.
Pad. The soft slap of feet on the tiles broke the silence.
Note
A word that imitates its own sound, probably tied to the verb of walking softly. It is usually repeated to mimic the rhythm of steps, as in pad, pad along the corridor. Inside a sentence of narration it is set off by commas or dashes, the way thump or patter might be.
- 28An extension cord ending in a multi-outlet block, letting several devices be plugged in at once.
The stage crew ran a heavy-duty pad to the far corner.
All the studio gear shared a single pad along the back wall.
Similarextension
- 29An informal term for a prison cell.
He was banged up in his pad for twenty-three hours a day.
They moved him to a pad on the top landing after the trouble.
Similarcell
Note
British prison talk, used by inmates and staff alike: a prisoner is banged up in his pad, or moved to a pad on another landing. It shares its sleeping-place logic with the American bed sense. Outside prison talk, cell is the neutral word and the one to use.
- 30The degree to which a signal's level has been reduced, as by an attenuator.
She inserted a pad to bring the microphone level within range.
A small pad on the input kept the amplifier from clipping.
Similarattenuator
Note
Sound engineers measure a pad in decibels: a 20 dB pad cuts the level by twenty decibels. The noun has a verb beside it. Db: The Sound Engineering Magazine wrote in 1967 of the practice to "pad down a condenser mike with as much as a 20-30 dB pad." The aim is to keep a strong signal from overloading the next stage.
- 31A steady background made by holding low reed notes for a long time beneath the music, heard most often in the blues.
- 32On a ship, a shaped wooden filler attached to a beam so the deck's camber is matched.
- 33To soak cloth evenly with a mordant so that dye will fix to it.
- 34A frog-like creature, the toad.
- 35A rough trail, especially one worn by animals rather than built.
- 36A horse with a gentle, comfortable gait, suited to easy riding.
- 37A thief who robbed travelers on the road while going on foot rather than on horseback.
A Pad came pacing down the way : / The Cur, with never-ceasing tongue , / Upon the passing trav'ler sprung
1720, John Gay, “Fables” - 38A vagrant, or a musician who wanders from place to place.
- 39A basket of woven wicker, often serving as a standard measure for fish and similar wares.
- 40To make one's way over a route on foot, as when tramping a road.
- 41To journey by walking.
- 42To beat down a track by walking over the same ground again and again.
- 43To move with soft, quiet, even steps, often barefoot.
- 44To rob travelers on the road.
Their chief Argument is, That they never saw any Witches, therefore there are none. Just as if you or I should say, We never met with any Robbers on the Road, therefore there never was any Padding there.
1689, Cotton Mather, Memorable Providences
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origins
First recorded in 1554 meaning a "bundle of straw to lie on," this word probably comes from Low German or West Flemish 'pad' ("sole of the foot"), perhaps ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *pent- ("to pass"), which would make it related to both 'path' and 'find'.
Probably imitative in origin, perhaps related to or influenced by Etymology 5 above.