Definitions
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- A Middle English form of lead.
- A Middle English form of lead.
- n. A man; in the plural, men; people.
- n. plural Tenements; holdings; possessions.
Wiktionary
- n. US, journalism The introductory paragraph(s) of a newspaper or other news article.
- n. singular A man; person.
- n. Scotland Men; people, folk.
- n. Scotland, singular A people or nation.
- n. plural Tenements; holdings; possessions.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the introductory section of a story
Etymologies
- From Middle English lede, leode, from Old English lēode ("men, people"), lēod ("man"). More at leod. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“Undoubtedly a moving and important story (I'll definitely check it out), but ... the lede is a little treacly, don't you think?”
“Therefore, the lede is not an exaggeration, but a reminder.”
Matthew Yglesias » Kathryn Jean-Lopez and Rush Limbaugh Are Not Very Intelligent
“The lede is a girls basketball team, but the lessons are larger: Davids win all the time.”
“The lede is that Grover puts forward a hypothetical in which it is assumed that the GOP can come up with ten good ideas, and also that teh Democrats would reject any such good ideas out of hand.”
“It's a nice article, but the lede is slightly off-base.”
“In the news journalism industry, particularly in the US, the particular news-style of lead used is sometimes referred to as a lede.”
The Huffington Post: Elizabeth Boleman-Herring: Still Seeking 'The Ineffable' in 2012
“Superdelegates Give Themselves Wiggle Room on Clinton-Obama" (Mike Soraghan, The Hill) Reporter Soraghan's lede is good: "As the fight over superdelegates gets harder, some of the superdelegate endorsements are getting softer.”
“The lede is particularly sparkling: Brünnhilde made a guest appearance Friday night in the middle of J.S. Bach's joyous Cantata No. 51 ( "Jauchzet Gott!"), a piece usually sung by lyric sopranos of the Kathleen Battle mold.”
“Op daardie stadium was daar al etlike polisie beseer, klippe teen die kop, waar bloed van die kop af gestroom het, teen die been gegooi het, die karre was stukkend gegooi, daar was baie min lede wat toe nog nie beseer of een of ander klein beserinkie gehad het as gevolg van die klippe nie en ek wou net die voertuie en die lede ten alle koste daar uit hê met die minste lewensverlies.”
'I Saw a Nightmare …' Doing Violence to Memory: The Soweto Uprising, June 16, 1976
“In the news business, the opening sentences of a story are referred to as its "lede" -- spelled that way, journalism lore has it, to avoid confusion with the lead typesetting that once dominated newspaper printing presses.”
Reporters Should Be Barred From Wars, Says Reporter - The Lede Blog - NYTimes.com
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘lede’.
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WWF WTF?
Ever play "Words With Friends" with someone and they throw down some strange, unlikely group of letters that makes even the most mild and squeaky clean tongued person say "whiskey tango foxtrot"? ...
oorie, sangar, merl, cwm, doum, weir, jura, invar, lawine, tapa, waw, shog and 376 more...
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*e?e
Words whose last and third-to-last letters are both "e".
here, eke, were, complete, mete, replete, adhere, where, mere, sphere, austere, aesthete and 99 more...
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Words I Don't Get to Use Enough
meretricious, languorous, inartful, caesura, truculent, hipsteratti, hiccius doccius, replevined, impudent, sessile, katabasis, pawl and 11 more...
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addendumb's Words
fey, cockshut, redact, beatific, melange, arcanum, rarefied, dissemble, capitulation, detritus, ennui, anodyne and 381 more...
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inkhorn's Words
inkhorn, aplomb, apotheosis, asinine, avatar, bombastic, boorish, bromide, bucolic, cagey, canvass, digress and 991 more...
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Useful
parkour, diegetic, callipygian, dasypygal, hypnagogic, hypnopompic, antejentacular, postprandial, perspicuity, perspicacity, föhn, traceur and 115 more...
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Bébé to Zeze
A more narrow version of *e?e by pterodactyl, this one is ?e?e.
nese, were, rete, tele, sene, deme, dere, meme, rese, here, jefe, rede and 131 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, L
lisle, lahar, loupe, labret, latten, luster, lagomorph, lamentation, limicole, lunge, lobtail, latifolious and 182 more...
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lanklenmot's Words
ineluctable, prelapsarian, bien pensant, prospero, preternatural, gratifying, iconoclast, cineast, persnickety, tumescent, galvanize, pap and 889 more...
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learning
A list of words whose meanings I am learning, either because a) I don't know the meaning b) I know the meaning, but could stand to better appreciate certain inflections or secondary meanings or c) ...
louche, educe, loam, cob, sclerotic, palliate, axial, syndicalist, ecumenical, sally, fatuous, parvenu and 1387 more...
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deegee's Words
pay-per-view, vitriol, delectable, snarky, unflinching, forsake, pervasive, inconsequential, unnerving, allure, endearing, unalloyed and 414 more...
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hober's Words
anglosphere, wiki, slither, cylon, satchel, faustian, ragamuffin, frak, salient, fervid, tartan, snowclone and 299 more...
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5-0
Hecko, words! I’m so happy I’ve found you. I want to keep you all and never want to lose you again. I hope you like it here.
amscray, thistledown, tine, tinsel, pungent, snarl, wail, lanky, viscid, dawdle, luminous, stow and 2719 more...
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Words That Populate My Mind
This is a collection of words I love, old ones that I love the sound of when I repeat them for years and new ones coined in news articles on up and coming trends and technologies - most of them I k...
aroma, mojo, blithely, fringe, fray, synchronicity, doublespeak, buzzword, thoughtcrime, portmanteau, newspeak, oldspeak and 963 more...
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froseph's list
saritorial, pogrom, synecdoche, metonymy, tonsorial, prophylactic, ozymandias, nepenthe, tonsorial, tranche, allodium, allodial and 158 more...
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miscellanea
antimacassar, snootful, sessile, glagolitic, marrowsky, farrago, keel, calumny, rheum, talisman, tally, awry and 508 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for lede.
swordnik It's interesting that 'lede' doesn't appear under the sense of 'lead' or 'intro' in the Century or OED. Wikipedia says it's journo-jargon, ostensibly used to differentiate itself from 'lead' or 'leading', the typographical property:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_style#Lead_or_intro
It's also not a valid Scrabble word under TWL or SOWPODS. Jan 18, 2010
tbtabby Usually used in the context of newspaper articles, for the first sentence which sums up the topic of the article. There are some very strange ledes out there. Here's one from MSNBC: "A carpenter who keeps his clothes clean by working in the nude was arrested after a client returned home early and found him building bookcases in the buff." Mar 27, 2009