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start

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Start, START, štart, and старт

English

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Alternative forms

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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From Middle English stert, from the verb sterten (“to start, startle”). See below.

Noun

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start (plural starts)

  1. The beginning of an activity.
    The movie was entertaining from start to finish.
  2. A sudden involuntary movement.
    He woke with a start.
  3. The beginning point of a race, a board game, etc.
    Captured pieces are returned to the start of the board.
  4. An appearance in a sports game, horserace, etc., from the beginning of the event.
    Jones has been a substitute before, but made his first start for the team last Sunday.
    • 2011 February 12, Ian Hughes, “Arsenal 2 - 0 Wolverhampton”, in BBC‎[1]:
      Wilshere, who made his first start for England in the midweek friendly win over Denmark, raced into the penalty area and chose to cross rather than shoot - one of the very few poor selections he made in the match.
  5. (horticulture) A young plant germinated in a pot to be transplanted later.
    • 2009, Liz Primeau, Steven A. Frowine, Gardening Basics For Canadians For Dummies:
      You generally see nursery starts at garden centres in mid to late spring. Small annual plants are generally sold in four-packs or larger packs, with each cell holding a single young plant.
  6. An initial advantage over somebody else; a head start.
    to get, or have, the start
    • 1914, Ernest Bramah, Max Carrados:
      The man has got two clear days' start and the chances are nine to one against catching him.
  7. (UK, slang, archaic) A happening or proceeding.
    • 1887, Hawley Smart, A False Start, volume 2, page 69:
      “It's a rum start, old John Madingley's coming down to Tunnleton,” said Grafton, one evening in the smoking-room; […]
  8. Alternative letter-case form of Start (“a typical button for video games, originally used to start a game, now also often to pause or choose an option”)
Derived terms
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Descendants
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  • → German: Start
  • → Persian: استارت (estârt)
  • → Japanese: スタート
Translations
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The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

Etymology 2

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From Middle English sterten (“to leap up suddenly, rush out”), from Old English styrtan (“to leap up, start”), from Proto-West Germanic *sturtijan (“to startle, move, set in motion”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ter- (“to be stiff”). Cognate with Old Frisian stirta (“to fall down, tumble”), Middle Dutch sterten (“to rush, fall, collapse”) (Dutch storten), Old High German sturzen (“to hurl, plunge, turn upside down”) (German stürzen), Old High German sterzan (“to be stiff, protrude”). More at stare.

Verb

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start (third-person singular simple present starts, present participle starting, simple past and past participle started)

  1. (ergative) To begin, commence, initiate.
    1. To set in motion.
      to start a stream of water;   to start a rumour;   to start a business
      • April 2, 1716, Joseph Addison, Freeholder No. 30
        I was some years ago engaged in conversation with a fashionable French Abbe, upon a subject which the people of that kingdom love to start in discourse.
      • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XXII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
        In the autumn there was a row at some cement works about the unskilled labour men. A union had just been started for them and all but a few joined. One of these blacklegs was laid for by a picket and knocked out of time.
    2. To begin.
      The President fired the gun to start the footrace.
      The rain started at 9:00.
      • 2013 July 19, Peter Wilby, “Finland spreads word on schools”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 30:
        Imagine a country where children do nothing but play until they start compulsory schooling at age seven. Then, without exception, they attend comprehensives until the age of 16. Charging school fees is illegal, and so is sorting pupils into ability groups by streaming or setting.
      • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
        Thinks I to myself, “Sol, you're run off your course again. This is a rich man's summer ‘cottage’  […] .” So I started to back away again into the bushes. But I hadn't backed more'n a couple of yards when I see something so amazing that I couldn't help scooching down behind the bayberries and looking at it.
    4. To ready the operation of a vehicle or machine.
      to start the engine
    5. To put or raise (a question, an objection); to put forward (a subject for discussion).
    6. To bring onto being or into view; to originate; to invent.
      • 1674, William Temple, letter to The Countess of Essex:
        Sensual men agree in the pursuit of every pleasure they can start.
  2. (intransitive) To have its origin (at), begin.
    The speed limit is 50 km/h, starting at the edge of town.
    The blue line starts one foot away from the wall.
  3. To move suddenly, from a previous state of rest; to startle.
    1. (intransitive) To jerk, jump up, flinch, or draw back in surprise.
      Synonym: jump
      • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene v]:
        But if he start,
        It is the flesh of a corrupted heart.
      • c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene v], page 257, column 2:
        I could a Tale vnfold, vvhoſe lighteſt vvord
        VVould harrovv vp thy ſoule, freeze thy young blood,
        Make thy tvvo eyes like Starres, ſtart from their Spheres,
        Thy knotty and combined locks to part,
        And each particular haire to ſtand an end,
        Like Quilles vpon the fretfull Porpentine: […]
      • 1681, John Dryden, The Spanish Fryar: Or, the Double Discovery. […], London: […] Richard Tonson and Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, (please specify the page number):
        I start as from some dreadful dream.
      • 1725, Isaac Watts, Logick: Or, The Right Use of Reason in the Enquiry after Truth, […], 2nd edition, London: […] John Clark and Richard Hett, […], Emanuel Matthews, […], and Richard Ford, […], published 1726, →OCLC:
        Keep your soul to the work when it is ready to start aside.
      • 1855, Robert Browning, Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came, section XXXI:
        [...] The tempest's mocking elf
        Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf
        He strikes on, only when the timbers start.
      • 1891, Oscar Wilde, chapter VIII, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, London; New York, N.Y.: Ward Lock & Co., →OCLC, page 139:
        Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the portrait, and he started.
      • 1836, Elizur Wright, Quarterly Anti-slavery Magazine, volume 2, page 162:
        Physical poison would make them start from arsenicked bread; shall not the moral poison which is in it, make them start more promptly still from slave produce?
    2. (intransitive) To awaken suddenly.
      • 1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], chapter IV, in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume I, London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC, page 100:
        I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became convulsed; [...]
    3. (transitive) To disturb and set in motion; to alarm; to rouse; to cause to flee.
      The hounds started a fox.
    4. (ergative, of an object) To come loose, to break free of a firmly set position; to displace or loosen; to dislocate.
      the storm started the bolts in the vessel
      • 1676, Richard Wiseman, Severall Chirurgicall Treatises, London: […] E. Flesher and J. Macock, for R[ichard] Royston […], and B[enjamin] Took, […], →OCLC:
        One, by a fall in wrestling, started the end of the clavicle from the sternon.
      • 1749, [John Cleland], “[Letter the First]”, in Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure [Fanny Hill], volume I, London: […] [Thomas Parker] for G. Fenton [i.e., Fenton and Ralph Griffiths] […], →OCLC, page 76:
        [...] we could, with the greateſt eaſe, as well as clearneſs, ſee all objects, (ourſelves unſeen) only by applying our eyes cloſe to the crevice, where the moulding of a pannel had warp'd, or ſtarted a little on the other ſide.
  4. (transitive, sports) To put into play.
    • 2010, Brian Glanville, The Story of the World Cup: The Essential Companion to South Africa 2010, London: Faber and Faber, →ISBN, page 361:
      The charge against Zagallo then is not so much that he started Ronaldo, but that when it should surely have been clear that the player was in no fit state to take part he kept him on.
    • 2024 May 6, Sid Lowe, “Portu’s brilliant burst seals Girona’s top-four fairytale in the perfect way”, in The Guardian‎[2], →ISSN:
      “Look at Portu,” Michel insisted, “he scores goals and I never start him. He says: ‘You’re sinking me, but OK, I’ll just go out and score again.’”
  5. (transitive, nautical) To pour out; to empty; to tap and begin drawing from.
    to start a water cask
  6. (intransitive, euphemistic) To begin one's menstrual cycle.
    Have you started yet?
Usage notes
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Synonyms
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Antonyms
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Derived terms
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Descendants
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Translations
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The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

Noun

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start (plural starts)

  1. An instance of starting.
Derived terms
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See also

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See also the terms derived from starting.

Etymology 3

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    From Middle English stert, start (“tail, handle, projection”), from Old English steort (“tail”), from Proto-West Germanic *stert, from Proto-Germanic *stertaz (“tail”). Cognate with Scots start, stairt (“side post, shaft, upright post”), Dutch staart (“tail”), German Sterz (“tail, handle”), Danish stjert (“tail of a bird”), Faroese stertur (“tail”), Icelandic stertur (“short horse tail”), Norn skjårt (“tail”), sterti (“tail of a large fish”), stjårt (“tail of a large fish”), Norwegian stjert (“tail of a bird”), Swedish stjärt (“tail, arse”).

    Noun

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    start (plural starts)

    1. A projection or protrusion; that which pokes out.
    2. The curved or inclined front and bottom of a water wheel bucket.
      • 1845, Captain R.E. Crawley, Description of a Water-Course, Wharf, and Water-Wheel, erected at Waltham Abbey, Essex […] :
        The fall of water is 6 feet, and the radius of the curve is 8 feet, from the centre of the water-wheel to the extreme point of the start.
    3. The arm, or level, of a gin, drawn around by a horse.
      • 1834, William Andrus Alcott, Samuel Griswold Goodrich, Parley's Magazine, page 364:
        ... horses, a number of men who seemed to acquire strength as the necessity for it increased, applied their shoulders to the starts, or shafts of the gin, and worked it with extraordinary speed. By twelve o'clock, thirty-two […]
      • 1854, Glynn, Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Cranes and Machinery for Raising Heavy Bodies, page 13:
        […] so that the horse may not expend his force in an oblique direction, but get a fair pull on the "starts."
      • 1973, Industrial Archaeology, page 254:
        With iron posts it is of course impossible to mortise in the starts and they were bolted between two cast-iron plates instead. The inclined stays were bolted to a […]
    Derived terms
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    Etymology 4

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    Variant of stark.[1]

    Adverb

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    start (comparative more start, superlative most start)

    1. (dialectal, archaic) Completely, utterly.
      • 1828 August 22, “Militia System”, in The New England Farmer, volume VII, Boston, M.A.: John B. Russell, published 1829, page 40, column 1:
        Col.—The age has no sense—the people are start mad—as mad as a March mare. We should have fine times, indeed if our laws did'nt compel the poor people to protect the property of the rich.

    References

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    1. ^ “start, adv.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.

    Anagrams

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    Breton

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    Adjective

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    start

    1. firm, strong
    2. difficult

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    Further reading

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    • Herve Ar Bihan, Colloquial Breton, pages 16 and 268: define "start" as "hard, difficult, firm"

    Crimean Tatar

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    Etymology

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    Borrowed from English start.

    Noun

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    start

    1. start

    Declension

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    Declension of start
    nominative start
    genitive startnıñ
    dative startqa
    accusative startnı
    locative startta
    ablative starttan

    References

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    • Mirjejev, V. A.; Usejinov, S. M. (2002), Ukrajinsʹko-krymsʹkotatarsʹkyj slovnyk [Ukrainian – Crimean Tatar Dictionary]‎[3], Simferopol: Dolya, →ISBN

    Czech

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    Etymology

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    Borrowed from English start.

    Pronunciation

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    Noun

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    start m inan

    1. start (beginning point of a race)

    Declension

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    Declension of start (hard masculine inanimate)
    singular plural
    nominative start starty
    genitive startu startů
    dative startu startům
    accusative start starty
    vocative starte starty
    locative startu startech
    instrumental startem starty
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    Further reading

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    Danish

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    Etymology

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    Borrowed from English start.

    Noun

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    start c (singular definite starten, plural indefinite starter)

    1. start

    Inflection

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    Declension of start
    common
    gender     		singular plural
    indefinite definite indefinite definite
    nominative start starten starter starterne
    genitive starts startens starters starternes

    Verb

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    start

    1. imperative of starte

    Dutch

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    Pronunciation

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    Etymology 1

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    Borrowed from English start.

    Noun

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    start m (plural starts, diminutive startje n)

    1. start
    Derived terms
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    Etymology 2

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    See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

    Verb

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    start

    1. inflection of starten:
      1. first/second/third-person singular present indicative
      2. imperative

    German

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    Pronunciation

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    Verb

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    start

    1. singular imperative of starten

    Indonesian

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    Etymology

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    Borrowed from Dutch start, from English start.

    Pronunciation

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    Verb

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    start

    1. synonym of memulai
    2. synonym of berangkat

    Noun

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    start (plural start-start)

    1. start (the beginning point of a race, a board game, etc.)
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    Further reading

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    Maltese

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    Pronunciation

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    Verb

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    start

    1. first/second-person singular perfect of satar

    Norwegian Bokmål

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    Etymology 1

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    Borrowed from English start.

    Noun

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    start m (definite singular starten, indefinite plural starter, definite plural startene)

    1. a start
      fra start til mål ― from start to finish
    Derived terms
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    Etymology 2

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    Verb

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    start

    1. imperative of starte

    References

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    Norwegian Nynorsk

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    Etymology

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    Borrowed from English start.

    Pronunciation

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    Noun

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    start m (definite singular starten, indefinite plural startar, definite plural startane)

    1. a start (beginning)

    Verb

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    start

    1. imperative of starta

    Derived terms

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    References

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    Polish

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    Polish Wikipedia has an article on:
    Wikipedia pl

    Etymology

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    Etymology tree
    English startbor.
    Polish start

      Borrowed from English start.

      Pronunciation

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      Noun

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      start m inan

      1. (sports) start (beginning of a race)
      2. (aviation) takeoff
        Z niecierpliwością czekałam na start samolotu do Paryża.
        I was impatiently waiting for the plane to Paris to take off/for its take-off.
      3. participation
        Większość kibiców ucieszyła się, że zdecydował się on na start w zawodach.
        Most fans were happy to hear that he had decided to take part in the competition.

      Declension

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      Declension of start
      singular plural
      nominative start starty
      genitive startu startów
      dative startowi startom
      accusative start starty
      instrumental startem startami
      locative starcie startach
      vocative starcie starty

      Derived terms

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      Further reading

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      • “start”, in Wielki słownik języka polskiego‎[4] (in Polish), Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
      • “start”, in Polish dictionaries at PWN‎[5] (in Polish)

      Portuguese

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      Etymology

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      Unadapted borrowing from English start.

      Noun

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      start m (plural starts)

      1. alternative form of estarte

      Romanian

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      Etymology

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      Borrowed from English start.

      Noun

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      start n (plural starturi)

      1. start (of a race)

      Declension

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      singular plural
      indefinite definite indefinite definite
      nominative-accusative start startul starturi starturile
      genitive-dative start startului starturi starturilor
      vocative startule starturilor

      Swedish

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      Etymology

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      Borrowed from English start.

      Pronunciation

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      Noun

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      start c

      1. a start; a beginning (of a race)
      2. the starting (of an engine)

      Declension

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      Declension of start
      nominative genitive
      singular indefinite start starts
      definite starten startens
      plural indefinite starter starters
      definite starterna starternas

      Derived terms

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      References

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      Anagrams

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      Turkish

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      Etymology

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      Borrowed from English start.

      Pronunciation

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      • IPA(key): [staɾt]
      • Hyphenation: start

      Noun

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      start (definite accusative startı, plural startlar)

      1. start

      Usage notes

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      Turkish phonotactics disallows complex syllable onsets, thus speakers may epenthesize a vowel after the first consonant, pronouncing it as [sɯtaɾt].

      Declension

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      Declension of start
      singular plural
      nominative start startlar
      definite accusative startı startları
      dative starta startlara
      locative startta startlarda
      ablative starttan startlardan
      genitive startın startların
      Possessive forms
      nominative
      singular plural
      1st singular startım startlarım
      2nd singular startın startların
      3rd singular startı startları
      1st plural startımız startlarımız
      2nd plural startınız startlarınız
      3rd plural startları startları
      definite accusative
      singular plural
      1st singular startımı startlarımı
      2nd singular startını startlarını
      3rd singular startını startlarını
      1st plural startımızı startlarımızı
      2nd plural startınızı startlarınızı
      3rd plural startlarını startlarını
      dative
      singular plural
      1st singular startıma startlarıma
      2nd singular startına startlarına
      3rd singular startına startlarına
      1st plural startımıza startlarımıza
      2nd plural startınıza startlarınıza
      3rd plural startlarına startlarına
      locative
      singular plural
      1st singular startımda startlarımda
      2nd singular startında startlarında
      3rd singular startında startlarında
      1st plural startımızda startlarımızda
      2nd plural startınızda startlarınızda
      3rd plural startlarında startlarında
      ablative
      singular plural
      1st singular startımdan startlarımdan
      2nd singular startından startlarından
      3rd singular startından startlarından
      1st plural startımızdan startlarımızdan
      2nd plural startınızdan startlarınızdan
      3rd plural startlarından startlarından
      genitive
      singular plural
      1st singular startımın startlarımın
      2nd singular startının startlarının
      3rd singular startının startlarının
      1st plural startımızın startlarımızın
      2nd plural startınızın startlarınızın
      3rd plural startlarının startlarının

      Antonyms

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