Jump to content

chain

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Chain and cháin

English

[edit]
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia
A metal chain
A chain of daisies
Molecular chain for acrylic

Etymology

[edit]
Etymology tree
Proto-Italic *katesnā
Latin catēna
Old French chaeinebor.
Middle English cheyne
English chain

    From Middle English cheyne, chaine, from Old French chaeine, chaene (“chain”), from Latin catēna (“chain”), from Proto-Indo-European *kat- (“to braid, twist; hut, shed”). Doublet of catena. Displaced native Middle English rakil and rakent (from Old English racente (“chain”)); see rackan.

    Pronunciation

    [edit]
    • IPA(key): /ˈt͡ʃeɪn/
    • Audio (US):(file)
    • Audio:(file)
    • Rhymes: -eɪn

    Noun

    [edit]

    chain (plural chains)

    3. A series of interconnected things.
      Near-synonyms: streak (A continuous series of like events.); string (A series of items or events; items arranged in a line; a trend; a sequence of words, letters, sounds, etc.); See also Thesaurus:sequence
      a chain of mountains
      a chain of ideas, one leading to the next
      This led to an unfortunate chain of events.
      1. An unbroken streak.
        We have to maintain chain of custody.
        You mustn't break the chain of this chain letter.
      3. A series of stores or businesses with the same brand name; a series of such stores as opposed to a small, independent shop.
        That chain of restaurants is expanding into our town.
        I love that place because it's not a chain.
      4. (always singular) A chain of command.
        Send it up the chain, so head office will have to deal with it.
      5. (figurative, economics) The sequence of processes and transactions that result in a product or commodity being available.
        cold chain, kill chain, supply chain, value chain
        • 2023, Siddharth Kara, Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives‎[2], St. Martin's Publishing Group:
          In public disclosures and press releases, the corporations perched atop the cobalt chain typically cite their commitments to international human rights norms, zero-tolerance policies on child labor, and adherence to the highest standards of supply chain due diligence.
      7. (weaving) The warp threads of a web.[1]
      9. (UK) A sequence of linked house purchases, each of which is dependent on the preceding and succeeding purchase (said to be "broken" if a buyer or seller pulls out).
      10. (cryptocurrencies) A blockchain.
      11. (biomechanics) A kinetic chain.
      13. (organic chemistry, physical chemistry) A number of atoms in a series, which combine to form a molecule.
        side chain
        When examined, the molecular chain included oxygen and hydrogen.
    5. (mathematics, set theory, order theory) A totally ordered set, especially a totally ordered subset of a poset.
      • 2003, Jeremy P. Spinrad, Efficient Graph Representations, American Mathematical Society, page 108:
        We first find an approximation of the chain partition, i.e. a small but not minimum size set of chains which cover all elements of the poset.
    7. (algebraic topology, originally) A formal sum of cells in a CW complex of a certain dimension k (in which case the formal sums are called k-chains); a formal sum of simplices or cubes of a certain dimension in a simplicial complex or cubical complex (respectively).
    9. (algebraic topology, homological algebra, more generally) An element of a group (or module) in a chain complex.

    Hyponyms

    [edit]

    Derived terms

    [edit]

    Descendants

    [edit]
    • → Ulithian: cheen

    Translations

    [edit]
    The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
    Translations to be checked

    Verb

    [edit]

    chain (third-person singular simple present chains, present participle chaining, simple past and past participle chained)

    1. (transitive) To fasten something with a chain.
      You should chain your bicycle to the railings to protect it from being stolen.
    2. (figurative) To connect as if with a chain, due to dependence, addiction, or other feelings
      Sometimes I feel like I'm chained to this computer.
      She's been chained to her principles since she was 18, it's unlikely you can convince her otherwise.
    3. (intransitive) To link multiple items together.
    4. (transitive) To secure someone with fetters.
    5. (transitive) To obstruct the mouth of a river etc with a chain.
    6. (figurative) To obligate.
      • 2017 August 13, Brandon Nowalk, “Oldtown offers one last game-changing secret as Game Of Thrones goes behind enemy lines (newbies)”, in The Onion AV Club‎[3], archived from the original on 17 August 2017:
        I miss when Game Of Thrones was wide open, but even then, the writers were chained to a narrative they didn’t yet know the ending of and feared straying too far from.
    7. (computing) To relate data items with a chain of pointers.
    8. (computing) To be chained to another data item.
      • 2016 January 15, Mark Papadakis, “Coroutines and Fibers. Why and When”, in Medium‎[4], archived from the original on 27 March 2025:
        You don’t need to maintain state, or partition execution into different objects that then you can chain together (one executes the other on completion — chained continuations).
    9. (transitive) To measure a distance using a 66-foot long chain, as in land surveying.
      • 1887, Harriet W. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 99:
        As the line was surveyed - a sufficient length being first chained by a surveyor, who was followed by axemen - trees had to be felled and a certain width maintained, which was specified in the contract, for drays had to follow, and the trees might have fallen upon the line and broken it down at the very outset.
    10. (transitive, computing, rare, associated with Acorn Computers) To load and automatically run (a program).
      • 1996, Mr D Walsh, “Running two programs from a batch file”, in comp.sys.acorn.misc (Usenet):
        How do you get one program to chain another? I want to run DrawWorks2 then !Draw but as soon as you run Drawworks2 it finishes the batch file and doesn't go on to the next instruction! Is there a way without loading one of these automatic loaders?
      • 1998, Juan Flynn, “BBC software transmitted on TV - how to load?”, in comp.sys.acorn.misc (Usenet):
        You can do LOAD "" or CHAIN "" to load or chain the next program if I remember correctly (it's been a loooong time since I've used a tape on an Acorn!)
      • 2006, Richard Porter, “SpamStamp double headers”, in comp.sys.acorn.apps (Usenet):
        Recent versions of AntiSpam no longer use the Config file but have a Settings file instead, so when I updated the Config file to chain SpamStamp it had no effect as it was a redundant file.

    Derived terms

    [edit]

    Translations

    [edit]

    References

    [edit]
    1. ^ Edward H[enry] Knight (1877), “Chain”, in Knight’s American Mechanical Dictionary. […], volumes I (A–GAS), New York, N.Y.: Hurd and Houghton […], →OCLC.

    Further reading

    [edit]

    Anagrams

    [edit]

    Welsh

    [edit]

    Pronunciation

    [edit]

    Adjective

    [edit]

    chain

    1. aspirate mutation of cain

    Mutation

    [edit]
    Mutated forms of cain
    radical soft nasal aspirate
    cain gain nghain chain

    Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Welsh.
    All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.

    Retrieved from "https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=chain&oldid=93754455"