strange

Less common meanings

4. 4
   kind of quarknouncountable

   One of the six flavors of quark, heavier than the up and down quarks and carrying nonzero strangeness.

   Physicists name the six quark flavors up, down, strange, charm, bottom, and top.

   The strange is heavier than the up and down quarks but much lighter than the charm.

   Note

   Physicists' shorthand drops the noun: a strange is simply a strange quark, and it counts like any other particle name, so one strange, two stranges. Its charge is given under the particle-physics adjective. Keep it apart from the uncountable slang noun, which never takes a or a plural, because the two can share a spelling but not a meaning. Source

   Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts

   • The particle-physics noun strange means a strange quark and is countable, with plural stranges. en.wiktionary.org
   • The slang noun strange is uncountable. en.wiktionary.org
   • Different senses of a word can occur in one sentence. A constructed counterexample is: A physicist studying a strange went looking for some strange. Their countability differs; that does not prohibit their appearing together. en.wikipedia.org
5. 5
   adjectiveslang

   Of a sexual partner or their body, unfamiliar and outside one's current relationship.

   He admitted the appeal of a strange lover lay entirely in her being forbidden.

   Bored with his marriage, he started sneaking out in search of strange flesh.

   Similarillicit, unfamiliar

   Oppositefamiliar

   Note

   Slang that treats a partner's body as unfamiliar territory: strange here means 'not my partner's', and the novelty is the whole appeal. It sits before the crudest nouns for genitals and is coarse by association, so keep it out of anything but deliberately frank speech. The noun for such sex grows from the same use.

6. 6
   cheating sexnounslanguncountable

   Sex with someone other than one's current partner.

   He wrecked a good marriage chasing strange across two states.

   She suspected he was getting strange while traveling for work.

   UsageUsually some strange or just strange, without a: get some strange, chase strange.

   Note

   Larry Doyle's Go, Mutants! (2010) uses it for men on the prowl, and J.D. Kleinke's Dudeville (2017) even capitalizes it: 'Nothing but Strange.' It carries the same crudeness as the adjective for an unfamiliar partner. Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

   • Larry Doyle wrote Go, Mutants!, published in a first edition in 2010. openlibrary.org
   • Go, Mutants! uses the noun for men seeking sexual encounters. en.wiktionary.org
   • J.D. Kleinke wrote Dudeville. everand.com
   • Dudeville contains the exact wording 'Nothing but Strange.', with Strange capitalized. en.wiktionary.org
7. 7
   adjectiveobsolete

   Unaccustomed to or inexperienced in something; not yet familiar with it.

   I know thee well; / But in thy fortunes am unlearn’d and strange.

   c. 1605, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”

   Similarinexperienced, green, new, raw, fresh

   Note

   The reverse of the 'unfamiliar' sense: there the thing is new to the person, and here the person is new to the thing. Shakespeare's Alcibiades admits being 'unlearn'd and strange' in Timon's fortunes, and the pairing shows the force: untaught, unversed, green. It is a word about inexperience, not oddness, and it takes in or to for the matter one lacks practice in. Source

   Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

   • The words 'unlearn'd and strange' occur in Shakespeare's Timon of Athens. en.wiktionary.org
   • Alcibiades speaks these words to Timon about Timon's fortunes in Timon of Athens, Act 4, scene 3. folger.edu
8. 8
   adjectiveobsolete

   Reserved or distant in manner; behaving coolly toward others.

   She may be strange and shy at first, but will soon learn to love thee!

   1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

   Good signiors both, when shall we laugh? say, when? / You grow exceeding strange: must it be so?

   c. 1596, William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”

   Similardistant, aloof, reserved, cool, standoffish

   Note

   Here the distance is in the bearing: a strange person holds back and keeps others at arm's length. In The Merchant of Venice, 'You grow exceeding strange' is a complaint about coolness, and Hawthorne still pairs the word with shy in The Scarlet Letter (1850). It describes manner toward people, so in older prose read it as aloof rather than peculiar. Source

   Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 5 facts

   • Strange historically meant reserved or distant in manner. en.wiktionary.org
   • The quoted words occur in The Merchant of Venice, spoken by Bassanio to Salarino and Salanio. opensourceshakespeare.org
   • The Shakespeare quotation complains about reserved or unfriendly behaviour. bard.org
   • Hawthorne pairs strange with shy in The Scarlet Letter; Hester Prynne speaks the words about Pearl. en.wikisource.org
   • The Scarlet Letter was first published in 1850. en.wikisource.org
9. 9
   adjectiveobsolete

   Backward or slow; lagging behind or reluctant to proceed.

   That to his name your barrenneſſe adds rule; / VVho louing the effect, vvould not be ſtrange / In fauoring the cause; looke on the profit, / And gaine vvill quickly point the miſchiefe out.

   c. 1607, [Francis Beaumont; John Fletcher; Philip Massinger], The Tragedy of Thierry King of France

   Note

   This is holding back from action rather than from people: to be strange in something was to be slow or reluctant to do it. Thierry and Theodoret, a play of disputed authorship, speaks of one who 'would not be strange / In fauoring the cause', meaning he would not hesitate to support it. The construction with in plus a verb sets it apart from the aloof sense. Source

   Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

   • Strange historically had the meaning backward or slow. en.wiktionary.org
   • The quoted wording occurs in Thierry and Theodoret. en.wiktionary.org
   • The passage describes someone who would not hesitate to favour a cause; Brunhalt says this about Theodoret. gutenberg.org
   • The example uses in followed by a verb in its -ing form. gutenberg.org
10. 10
    verbobsoleteintransitive

    To be struck with wonder or astonishment at something.

    Note

    A verb of wonder rather than distance: to strange at something was to marvel at it. In The Vanity of Dogmatizing (1661), Joseph Glanvill writes that 'we need not strange at' Aristotle's assertions. The at is the point, because the verb works like marvel at or wonder at rather than taking a direct object. Modern English would say be surprised at. Source

    Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 5 facts

    • The historical verb strange could mean to marvel or be astonished. en.wiktionary.org
    • Joseph Glanvill wrote The Vanity of Dogmatizing. en.wikipedia.org
    • The Vanity of Dogmatizing was first published in 1661. openlibrary.org
    • Glanvill uses the quoted words about assertions attributed to Aristotle; the original uses long s. archive.org
    • In this construction, strange takes at rather than a direct object. archive.org
11. 11
    verbobsoletetransitive

    To make or become estranged; to alienate someone from another, or to grow distant from another person.

    Note

    The verb lost out to its own doublet. Strange and estrange share one Latin source, and estrange is the verb English kept. Used with an object, strange meant to drive someone away in feeling or loyalty. It conjugated regularly (stranges, stranging, stranged), but today estrange or alienate does the work, and the older verb survives only in period writing. Source

    Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts

    • Strange and estrange are etymological doublets sharing the Latin source extraneus. en.wiktionary.org
    • The transitive historical verb strange meant to alienate someone. en.wiktionary.org
    • Strange has the regular inflected forms stranges, stranging, and stranged. en.wiktionary.org
12. 12
    adjective

    Having the quantum mechanical property called strangeness, carried by certain subatomic particles.
13. 13
    adjective

    Of an attractor: having a fractal structure, as in chaotic systems, where paths that start close together soon diverge yet never exactly repeat.
14. 14
    adjectivearchaic

    Belonging to another person rather than oneself; not one's own.