cement

• caement, cæment (archaic)

From Middle English syment, cyment, from Old French ciment, from Latin caementum (“quarry stone; stone chips for making mortar”), from caedō (“I cut, hew”). Doublet of cementum.

• IPA^(key): /səˈmɛnt/

  • Audio (US):

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  • Audio (General Australian):

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  • Audio (Southern England):

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• (Southern US) IPA^(key): /ˈsi.mɛnt/
• Rhymes: -ɛnt
• Hyphenation: ce‧ment

cement (countable and uncountable, plural cements)

1. (countable, uncountable) A powdered substance produced by firing (calcining) calcium carbonate (limestone) and clay that develops strong cohesive properties when mixed with water. The main ingredient of concrete.
   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XXII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

     In the autumn there was a row at some cement works about the unskilled labour men. A union had just been started for them and all but a few joined. One of these blacklegs was laid for by a picket and knocked out of time.

2. (uncountable) The paste-like substance resulting from mixing such a powder with water, or the rock-like substance that forms when it dries.
3. (uncountable) Any material with strong adhesive and cohesive properties such as binding agents, glues, grout.
4. (figurative) A bond of union; that which unites firmly, as persons in friendship or in society.

   the cement of our love

5. (anatomy) The layer of bone investing the root and neck of a tooth; cementum.

• concrete

cement (third-person singular simple present cements, present participle cementing, simple past and past participle cemented)

1. (transitive) To affix with cement.
2. (transitive) To overlay or coat with cement.

   to cement a cellar floor

3. (transitive, figurative) To unite firmly or closely.
   • c. 1606–1607 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]:

     For they have entertained cause enough
     To draw their swords: but how the fear of us
     May cement their divisions and bind up
     The petty difference, we yet not know.

   • 1840, John Dunlop, The Universal Tendency to Association in Mankind. Analyzed and Illustrated, London: Houlston and Stoneman, page 103:

     Olympic Games. — Besides the ordinary confederacies that join independent states together, a singular federal bond is remarkable in the Olympic games, which for many ages cemented the Grecian commonwealths by a joint tie of recreation and religious ritual.

4. (figuratively) To make permanent.
   • 1758, David Hume, “Essay XXII. Of Polygamy and Divorces.”, in Essays and Treatises on Several Subjects, new edition, London: Printed for A[ndrew] Millar, in the Strand; and A. Kincaid and A. Donaldson, at Edinburgh, →OCLC, page 115:

     But friendſhip is a calm and ſedate affection, conducted by reaſon and cemented by habit; ſpringing from long acquaintance and mutual obligations; without jealouſies or fears; and without thoſe feveriſh fits of heat and cold, which cauſe ſuch an agreeable torment in the amorous paſſion.

   • 2016 March 27, Daniel Taylor, “Eric Dier seals England’s stunning comeback against Germany”, in The Guardian‎^[1], London, archived from the original on 22 April 2016:

     [Dele] Alli’s ability to break forward from midfield was a prominent feature and the 19-year-old must have gone a long way to cementing his place in the team.

   • 2024 February 15, Fani Willis, 38:21 from the start, in See Fani Willis' entire defiant testimony in stunning courtroom moment‎^[2], MSNBC, archived from the original on February 16, 2024:

     Me and Mr. Wade, we are good friends. My respect for him has grown over these seven weeks of attacks. We are very good friends. I think but for these attacks, it would have been a friendship that, as life goes, we would have stopped having. I think that you have cemented that we'll be friends to the day we die.

• IPA^(key): [ˈt͡sɛmɛnt]

cement m inan

1. cement

• “cement”, in Příruční slovník jazyka českého (in Czech), 1935–1957
• “cement”, in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého (in Czech), 1960–1971, 1989

cement c

1. cement

• cementblandar

From Middle Dutch ciment, from Old French ciment, from Latin caementum.

• IPA^(key): /səˈmɛnt/

• Audio:

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• Hyphenation: ce‧ment
• Rhymes: -ɛnt

cement n (uncountable)

1. cement (powder, paste)

• Afrikaans: sement
• → Caribbean Hindustani: samenti
• → Caribbean Javanese: semèn
• → Indonesian: semen
• → Papiamentu: semènt, samènt
• → West Frisian: semint

cement

1. Alternative form of syment

Borrowed from German Zement, from late Middle High German cēment, from earlier zīment, zīmente, from Old French ciment, from Latin caementum.

• IPA^(key): /ˈt͡sɛ.mɛnt/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛmɛnt
• Syllabification: ce‧ment

cement m inan

1. cement (powdered substance)
2. cement (paste-like substance)

• cement in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• cement in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Borrowed from French cément.

cement n (plural cementuri)

1. cementum

Borrowed from German Zement, from Latin caementum (“quarry stone; stone chips for making mortar”), from caedo (“I cut, hew”).

• IPA^(key): /t͡sěment/
• Hyphenation: ce‧ment

cèment m (Cyrillic spelling цѐмент)

1. cement

cement c

1. cement

• cementblandare