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rule

Pronunciation: /ɹuːl/

The English word “rule” has 17 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A regulation, law, guideline.
  2. A regulating principle.
  3. The act of ruling; administration of law; government; empire; authority; control.
  4. A normal condition or state of affairs.
  5. Conduct; behaviour.
  6. An order regulating the practice of the courts, or an order made between parties to an action or a suit.
  7. A determinate method prescribed for performing any operation and producing a certain result.
  8. A ruler; device for measuring, a straightedge, a measure.
  9. A straight line (continuous mark, as made by a pen or the like), especially one lying across a paper as a guide for writing.
  10. A thin plate of brass or other metal, of the same height as the type, and used for printing lines, as between columns on the same page, or in tabular work.
  11. Revelry.

verb

  1. To regulate, be in charge of, make decisions for, reign over.
  2. To excel.
  3. To decide judicially.
  4. To establish or settle by, or as by, a rule; to fix by universal or general consent, or by common practice.
  5. To mark (paper or the like) with rules (lines).
  6. To revel.

Etymology

From Middle English reule, rewle, rule, borrowed from Old French riule, reule, from Latin regula (“straight stick, bar, ruler, pattern”), from regō (“to keep straight, direct, govern, rule”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₃réǵeti (“to straighten; right”), from the root *h₃reǵ-; see regent. Doublet of rail, regal, regula, and rigol.

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