Ray

Pronunciation

• RP enPR: rā, IPA: /ɹeɪ/
• Rhymes: -eɪ

Via Middle English, from Old French rai, from Latin radius ("staff, stake, spoke").

Full definition of ray

Noun

1. A beam of light or radiation.I saw a ray of light through the clouds.
2. (zoology) A rib-like reinforcement of bone or cartilage in a fish's fin.
3. (zoology) One of the spheromeres of a radiate, especially one of the arms of a starfish or an ophiuran.
4. (botany) A radiating part of a flower or plant; the marginal florets of a compound flower, such as an aster or a sunflower; one of the pedicels of an umbel or other circular flower cluster; radius.
5. (obsolete) Sight; perception; vision; from an old theory of vision, that sight was something which proceeded from the eye to the object seen.
• Alexander PopeAll eyes direct their rays
  On him, and crowds turn coxcombs as they gaze.
6. (mathematics) A line extending indefinitely in one direction from a point.
7. (colloquial) A tiny amount.Unfortunately he didn't have a ray of hope.

Derived terms

Verb

1. (transitive) To emit something as if in rays.
2. (intransitive) To radiate as if in rays

Old French raie, from Latin raia.

Noun

1. A marine fish with a flat body, large wing-like fins, and a whip-like tail.

Shortened from array.

Verb

1. (obsolete) To arrange. 14th-18th c.
2. (now rare) To dress, array (someone). from 14th c.
3. (obsolete) To stain or soil; to defile. 16th-19th c.
• 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, VI.4:From his soft eyes the teares he wypt away,
  And form his face the filth that did it ray ....

From its sound, by analogy with the letters chay, jay, gay, kay, which it resembles graphically.

Noun

1. The name of the letter ⟨/⟩, one of two which represent the r sound in Pitman shorthand.

Related terms

• ar, in Latin and the name of the other Pitman r

Noun

1. (obsolete) Array; order; arrangement; dress.
• SpenserAnd spoiling all her gears and goodly ray.

Alternative forms.

Noun

1. (music) Alternative form of re

Anagrams

• ayr, Ayr, yar