syntax

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. The study of the rules whereby words or other elements of sentence structure are combined to form grammatical sentences.
2. n. A publication, such as a book, that presents such rules.
3. n. The pattern of formation of sentences or phrases in a language.
4. n. Such a pattern in a particular sentence or discourse.
5. n. Computer Science The rules governing the formation of statements in a programming language.
6. n. A systematic, orderly arrangement.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. Connected system or order; union of things.
2. n. In grammar, the construction of sentences; the due forming and arrangement of words or members of sentences in their mutual relations according to established usage. Syntax includes the proper use of parts of speech and of forms in their combinations to make sentences, and their proper arrangement or collocation.

Wiktionary

1. n. A set of rules that govern how words are combined to form phrases and sentences.
2. n. computing, countable The formal rules of formulating the statements of a computer language.
3. n. linguistics The study of the structure of phrases, sentences and language.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. obsolete Connected system or order; union of things; a number of things jointed together; organism.
2. n. That part of grammar which treats of the construction of sentences; the due arrangement of words in sentences in their necessary relations, according to established usage in any language.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. the grammatical arrangement of words in sentences
2. n. studies of the rules for forming admissible sentences
3. n. a systematic orderly arrangement