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a

Pronunciation: /æ/

The English word “a” has 20 meanings listed here.

numeral

  1. The first numeral symbol of the English alphabet, called ay and written in the Latin script.

noun

  1. The name of the Latin script letter A/a.

article

  1. An unspecified example of (something); the indefinite article.
  2. One; used before score, dozen, hundred, thousand, million, etc.
  3. Used in some phrases denoting quantity, such as a few, a good many, a couple, a little, a bit, etc.
  4. Used before a numeral.
  5. Used in some adverbial phrases denoting the degree or extent of an action, such as a little, a bit, a lot, etc.
  6. The same; one and the same. Used in phrases such as of a kind, birds of a feather, etc.
  7. Any; every; used before a noun which has become modified to limit its scope.
  8. Any; used with a negative to indicate not a single one.
  9. Used before an adjective that modifies a noun (singular or plural) delimited by a numeral.
  10. One; someone named; used before a person's name, suggesting that the speaker knows little about the person other than the name.
  11. Used before an adjective modifying a person's name, typically used to emphasize that person's current condition or emotional state.
  12. Someone or something like; similar to; used before a proper noun to create an example out of it.

preposition

  1. To do with separation; In, into.
  2. To do with time; Each, per, in, on, by. Often occurs between two nouns, where the first noun occurs at the end of a verbal phrase.
  3. To do with status; In.
  4. To do with position or direction; In, on, at, by, towards, onto.
  5. To do with process, with a passive verb; In the course of, experiencing.
  6. To do with an action, an active verb; Engaged in.

Etymology

The letter name is from Middle English ā, from Old French, ultimately from Latin ā. Use of the Latin letter in (Old) English displaced the futhorc letter ᚪ (a) beginning in the 7th century, and partially also ᚫ (æ).

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.