cord

Etymology

From Old French corde, from Latin chorda, from Ancient Greek (Doric) χορδά (khordá), Ionic χορδή (khordḗ, “string of gut, the string of a lyre”). More at yarn and hernia.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /kɔɹd/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /kɔːd/

• Audio (US)

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• Rhymes: -ɔː(ɹ)d
• Homophones: chord, cored, cawed (in non-rhotic accents)

Noun

cord (countable and uncountable, plural cords)

1. A long, thin, flexible length of twisted yarns (strands) of fiber (rope, for example); (uncountable) such a length of twisted strands considered as a commodity.

   The burglar tied up the victim with a cord.

   He looped some cord around his fingers.

2. A small flexible electrical conductor composed of wires insulated separately or in bundles and assembled together usually with an outer cover; the electrical cord of a lamp, sweeper ((US) vacuum cleaner), or other appliance.
3. A unit of measurement for firewood, equal to 128 cubic feet (4 × 4 × 8 feet), composed of logs and/or split logs four feet long and none over eight inches diameter. It is usually seen as a stack four feet high by eight feet long.
   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

     Unerringly impelling this dead, impregnable, uninjurable wall, and this most buoyant thing within; there swims behind it all a mass of tremendous life, only to be adequately estimated as piled wood is—by the cord […]

4. (figuratively) Any influence by which persons are caught, held, or drawn, as if by a cord.
   • Tennyson

     The knots that tangle human creeds, / The wounding cords that bind and strain / The heart until it bleeds.

   • 1900, Charles W. Chesnutt, The House Behind the Cedars, Chapter I,

     Every detail of the house and garden was familiar; a thousand cords of memory and affection drew him thither; but a stronger counter-motive prevailed.

5. (anatomy) Any structure having the appearance of a cord, especially a tendon or nerve.

   spermatic cord; spinal cord; umbilical cord; vocal cords

6. Dated form of chord: musical sense.
7. Misspelling of chord: a cross-section measurement of an aircraft wing.

Verb

cord (third-person singular simple present cords, present participle cording, simple past and past participle corded)

1. To furnish with cords
2. To tie or fasten with cords
3. To flatten a book during binding
4. To arrange (wood, etc.) in a pile for measurement by the cord.

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin cor, cordis.

Noun

cord n (plural corduri)

1. (anatomy) heart