mold

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A hollow form or matrix for shaping a fluid or plastic substance.
2. n. A frame or model around or on which something is formed or shaped.
3. n. Something that is made in or shaped on a mold.
4. n. The shape or pattern of a mold.
5. n. General shape or form: the oval mold of her face.
6. n. Distinctive character or type: a leader in the mold of her predecessors.
7. n. A fixed or restrictive pattern or form: a method of scientific investigation that broke the mold and led to a new discovery.
8. n. Architecture See molding.
9. v. To shape in or on a mold.
10. v. To form into a particular shape; give shape to.
11. v. To guide or determine the growth or development of; influence: a teacher who helps to mold the minds of his students.
12. v. To fit closely by following the contours of.
13. v. To make a mold of or from (molten metal, for example) before casting.
14. v. To ornament with moldings.
15. v. To be shaped in or as if in a mold: shoes that gradually molded to my feet.
16. n. Any of various fungi that often cause disintegration of organic matter.
17. n. The growth of such fungi.
18. v. To become moldy.
19. n. Loose friable soil, rich in humus and fit for planting.
20. n. Chiefly British The earth; the ground.
21. n. Chiefly British The earth of the grave.
22. n. Archaic Earth as the substance of the human body.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. Fine soft earth, or earth easily pulverized, such as constitutes soil; crumbling or friable soil.
2. n. The earth; the ground.
3. n. The matter of which anything is formed; material.
4. To cover with mold.
5. To grow musty; become moldy; contract mold.
6. To cause to contract mold: as, damp molds cheese.
7. Grown musty; molded; moldy.
8. n. A minute fungus or other vegetable growth of a low type, especially one of such vegetable organisms as appear on articles of food when left neglected, decaying matter, bodies which lie long in warm and damp air, animal and vegetable tissues, etc.; in a somewhat looser sense, mustiness or incipient decay. Most of the common molds belong to the genus Mucor. M. Mucedo forms small downy tufts of grayish–white color on bread, decaying fruit, etc. M. Syzygites occurs on decaying mushrooms. Phycomyces nitens, a related form, grows on oily or greasy substances. The common blue mold on decaying bread, cheese, etc., is Penicillium glaucum. See Mucor, Mucorini, Penicillium.
9. n. A spot; a stain, as that caused by rust.
10. To stain, as with rust.
11. n. A form or model pattern of a particular shape, used in determining the shape of something in a molten, plastic, or otherwise yielding state.
12. n. Form; shape; cast; character.
13. n. Specifically, in founding, the form into which a fused metal is run to obtain a cast. Molds for metals and alloys having a low melting-point, as lead, type-metal, Britannia metal, etc., are made of iron or plaster of Paris, and may be used many times. Molds for the less fusible metals and alloys, as iron, brass, bell-metal, etc., are made in sand or loam and are divided into three classes:
14. n. In terra-cotta work, the plaster forms used in making terra-cotta architectural ornaments. They are usually in a number of parts, and when the clay is set sufficiently the mold is carefully taken apart. Similar molds are used also for glass, pottery, and waxwork.
15. n. In stucco-work, a templet or former for shaping cornices, centerpieces, etc.
16. n. In paper-manufacture, a frame with a bottom of wire netting which is filled with paper-pulp that in draining away leaves a film of pulp which is formed into a sheet of paper.
17. n. In ship-building, the pattern used in working out the frames of a vessel.
18. n. A former or matrix used in various household operations, as an incised stamp of wood for shaping and ornamenting pats of butter, or a form of metal, earthenware, etc., for giving shape to jellies, blanc-mange, ices, etc.
19. n. In cookery, a dish shaped in a mold: as, a mold of jelly.
20. n. In anatomy, same as fontanelle, 2.
21. n. Among gold-beaters, a number of pieces of vellum or a like substance, laid over one another, between which the leaves of gold are laid for the final beating.
22. To form into a particular shape; shape; model; fashion; cast in or as in a mold; specifically, to form articles of clay upon a whirling table or potter's wheel, or in molds which open and close like those employed in metal-casting.
23. In ship-building, to give the required depth and outline to, as ships' timbers.
24. n. An obsolete form of mole.
25. n. In paleontology, the external impression of an organic body, test, or skeleton in the rocks: contrasted with cast, which is an internal impression. See cast, 14.

Wiktionary

1. n. A hollow form or matrix for shaping a fluid or plastic substance.W
2. n. A frame or model around or on which something is formed or shaped.
3. n. Something that is made in or shaped on a mold.
4. n. The shape or pattern of a mold.
5. n. General shape or form.
6. n. Distinctive character or type.
7. n. A fixed or restrictive pattern or form
8. n. See molding.
9. n. A natural substance in the form of a woolly or furry growth of tiny fungi that appears when organic material lies for a long time exposed to (usually warm and moist) air.
10. n. Loose friable soil, rich in humus and fit for planting.
11. v. To shape in or on a mold.
12. v. To form into a particular shape; to give shape to.
13. v. To guide or determine the growth or development of; influence; as, a teacher who helps to mold the minds of his students
14. v. To fit closely by following the contours of.
15. v. To make a mold of or from (molten metal, for example) before casting.
16. v. To ornament with moldings.
17. v. To be shaped in or as if in a mold.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A spot; a blemish; a mole.
2. n. Crumbling, soft, friable earth; esp., earth containing the remains or constituents of organic matter, and suited to the growth of plants; soil.
3. n. Earthy material; the matter of which anything is formed; composing substance; material.
4. v. To cover with mold or soil.
5. n. A growth of minute fungi of various kinds, esp. those of the great groups Hyphomycetes, and Physomycetes, forming on damp or decaying organic matter.
6. v. To cause to become moldy; to cause mold to grow upon.
7. v. To become moldy; to be covered or filled, in whole or in part, with a mold.
8. n. The matrix, or cavity, in which anything is shaped, and from which it takes its form; also, the body or mass containing the cavity
9. n. That on which, or in accordance with which, anything is modeled or formed; anything which serves to regulate the size, form, etc., as the pattern or templet used by a shipbuilder, carpenter, or mason.
10. n. Cast; form; shape; character.
11. n. A group of moldings
12. n. A fontanel.
13. n. A frame with a wire cloth bottom, on which the pump is drained to form a sheet, in making paper by hand.
14. v. To form into a particular shape; to shape; to model; to fashion.
15. v. To ornament by molding or carving the material of.
16. v. To knead.
17. v. To form a mold of, as in sand, in which a casting may be made.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. container into which liquid is poured to create a given shape when it hardens
2. n. a distinctive nature, character, or type
3. v. fit tightly, follow the contours of
4. n. sculpture produced by molding
5. n. a fungus that produces a superficial growth on various kinds of damp or decaying organic matter
6. v. form by pouring (e.g., wax or hot metal) into a cast or mold
7. v. form in clay, wax, etc
8. n. loose soil rich in organic matter
9. v. shape or influence; give direction to
10. n. a dish or dessert that is formed in or on a mold
11. v. become moldy; spoil due to humidity
12. v. make something, usually for a specific function
13. n. the distinctive form in which a thing is made
14. n. the process of becoming mildewed