Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A simple rigid structure in the shape of an L, one arm of which is fixed to a vertical surface, the other projecting horizontally to support a shelf or other weight.
  • noun A small shelf or shelves supported by such structures.
  • noun Architecture A decorative or weight-bearing structural unit, two sides of which form a right angle with one arm flush against a wall and the other flush beneath a projecting surface, such as eaves or a bay window.
  • noun A wall-anchored fixture for gas or electricity.
  • noun A square bracket.
  • noun An angle bracket.
  • noun Chiefly British One of a pair of parentheses.
  • noun A classification or grouping, especially within a sequence of numbers or grades, as a category of incomes sharing the same tax rate.
  • noun The distance between two impacting shells, the first aimed beyond a target and the second aimed short of it, used to determine the range for artillery fire.
  • noun The shells fired in such a manner.
  • transitive verb To furnish or support with a bracket or brackets.
  • transitive verb To place within or as if within brackets.
  • transitive verb To classify or group together.
  • transitive verb To include or exclude by establishing specific boundaries.
  • transitive verb To fire beyond and short of (a target) in order to determine artillery range.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In ship-building, to unite by a bracket.
  • noun In carriages, a heavy standard placed at an incline at the front end of the boot of a coach as a support for the foot-board.
  • noun A stiffening-rib on a casting.
  • noun In wood ship-building, a short crooked timber, resembling a knee, for support or ornament.
  • noun In iron ship-building, a piece of plate of a triangular shape uniting, at their junction, two parts which meet at an angle to strengthen the joint against flexure.
  • noun A supporting piece or combination of pieces of moderate projection, generally springing from a vertical surface.
  • noun A gas-pipe with a burner, and often a support for a shade or globe, projecting from a wall or pillar.
  • noun In gunnery, the cheek of a mortar-carriage, made of strong planking.
  • noun One of two marks [ ], formerly called crotchets, used to inclose a note, reference, explanation, or the like, and thus separate it from the context; sometimes, also, one of a pair of braces { } similarly used, or a single brace { used to couple two or more lines or names.
  • noun The position of being classed or bracketed with another or others.
  • noun A name given to a head-dress of the fourteenth century.
  • noun In mining, the platform over the mouth of a shaft.
  • To furnish with or support by a bracket or brackets; in writing and printing, to place within brackets.
  • To place on or within the same bracket or brackets; join or mention together as coequal or correlative; connect by or as if by a printers' brace: as, the names of Smith and Jones are bracketed, or bracketed together, as candidates.
  • noun Same as bragget.
  • Brackish; salt; briny: as, “living upon beef and brack water.”

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To place within brackets; to connect by brackets; to furnish with brackets.
  • transitive verb (Gunnery) To shoot so as to establish a bracket for (an object).
  • noun (Arch.) An architectural member, plain or ornamental, projecting from a wall or pier, to support weight falling outside of the same; also, a decorative feature seeming to discharge such an office.
  • noun (Engin. & Mech.) A piece or combination of pieces, usually triangular in general shape, projecting from, or fastened to, a wall, or other surface, to support heavy bodies or to strengthen angles.
  • noun (Naut.) A shot, crooked timber, resembling a knee, used as a support.
  • noun (Mil.) The cheek or side of an ordnance carriage.
  • noun (Print.) One of two characters [], used to inclose a reference, explanation, or note, or a part to be excluded from a sentence, to indicate an interpolation, to rectify a mistake, or to supply an omission, and for certain other purposes; -- called also crotchet.
  • noun A gas fixture or lamp holder projecting from the face of a wall, column, or the like.
  • noun (Gunnery) A figure determined by firing a projectile beyond a target and another short of it, as a basis for ascertaining the proper elevation of the piece; -- only used in the phrase, to establish a bracket. After the bracket is established shots are fired with intermediate elevations until the exact range is obtained. In the United States navy it is called fork.
  • noun a gas fixture or a lamp attached to a wall, column, etc.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A fixture attached to a wall to hold up a shelf.
  • noun engineering Any intermediate object that connects a smaller part to a larger part, the smaller part typically projecting sideways from the larger part.
  • noun "(" and ")" specifically, the other forms above requiring adjectives for disambiguation.
  • noun One of several ranges of numbers.
  • verb To bound on both sides, to surround as enclosing with brackets.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Possibly French braguette, codpiece, diminutive of brague, breeches, from Old Provençal braga, from Latin brācae, from Gaulish brāca, leg covering.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

bragget, probably from Middle French braguette.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word bracket.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • If you don’t use brackets in an internally consistent fashion, whether someone else likes the way you chose their styles, you’re an illiterate, uneducated and like not worth the trouble to read, worthless flake.

    Alternatively, you’re a poet.

    - http://www.maccompanion.com/macc/archives/September2009/Columns/Brackets.htm

    September 15, 2009

  • "4. One of two marks , formerly called crotchets, used to inclose a note, reference, explanation, or the like, and thus separate it from the context; sometimes, also, one of a pair of braces similarly used, or a single brace { used to couple two or more lines or names."

    --Century Dictionary

    March 9, 2011

  • mushrooms as brackets: room to mush? (see visuals below)

    August 5, 2011