try
English
Pronunciation
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 159: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value GenAm is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. enPR: trī, IPA(key): /tɹaɪ/, [tʰɹaɪ], [t̠ɹ̠̊˔ʷaɪ]
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 159: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value RP is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. enPR: trī, IPA(key): /tɹaɪ/
Audio (US): (file) Audio (UK): (file) - Rhymes: -aɪ
Etymology 1
From Middle English trien (“to try a legal case”), from Anglo-Norman trier (“to try a case”), Old French trier (“to choose, pick out or separate from others, sift, cull”), of uncertain origin. Believed to be a metathetic variation of Old French tirer (“to pull out, snatch”), from Gothic 𐍄𐌹𐍂𐌰𐌽 (tiran, “to tear away, remove”), from Proto-Germanic *teraną (“to tear, tear apart”), from Proto-Indo-European *der- (“to tear, tear apart”), see tear. Related to Occitan triar (“to pick out, choose from among others”).
Replaced native Middle English cunnen (“to try”) (from Old English cunnian), Middle English fandien (“to try, prove”) (from Old English fandian), and Middle English costnien (“to try, tempt, test”) (from Old English costnian).
Verb
try (third-person singular simple present tr, present participle ies, simple past and past participle tried)
- To attempt; to endeavour. Followed by infinitive.
- I tried to rollerblade, but I couldn’t.
- I'll come to dinner soon. I'm trying to beat this level first.
- 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 22, in The Mirror and the Lamp:
- Not unnaturally, “Auntie” took this communication in bad part. Thus outraged, she showed herself to be a bold as well as a furious virago. Next day she found her way to their lodgings and tried to recover her ward by the hair of the head.
- 2014 June 21, “Magician’s brain”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8892:
- [Isaac Newton] was obsessed with alchemy. He spent hours copying alchemical recipes and trying to replicate them in his laboratory. He believed that the Bible contained numerological codes.
- (obsolete) To divide; to separate.
- To separate (precious metal etc.) from the ore by melting; to purify, refine.
- 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, II.vii:
- euery feend his busie paines applide, / To melt the golden metall, ready to be tride.
- 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, II.vii:
- (one sort from another) To winnow; to sift; to pick out; frequently followed by out.
- to try out the wild corn from the good
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Sir T. Elyot to this entry?)
- (nautical) To extract oil from blubber or fat; to melt down blubber to obtain oil
- To extract wax from a honeycomb
- To separate (precious metal etc.) from the ore by melting; to purify, refine.
- To test, to work out.
- To make an experiment. Usually followed by a present participle.
- I tried mixing more white paint to get a lighter shade.
- To put to test.
- I shall try my skills on this.
- 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 4, in The Celebrity:
- The Celebrity, by arts unknown, induced Mrs. Judge Short and two other ladies to call at Mohair on an afternoon when Mr. Cooke was trying a trotter on the track. The three returned wondering and charmed with Mrs. Cooke; they were sure she had had no hand in the furnishing of that atrocious house.
- 1922, E. F. Benson, Miss Mapp, p. 89:
- “So mousie shall only find tins on the floor now,” thought Miss Mapp. “Mousie shall try his teeth on tins.”
- 2013 May-June, David Van Tassel, Lee DeHaan, “Wild Plants to the Rescue”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:
- Plant breeding is always a numbers game. […] The wild species we use are rich in genetic variation, and individual plants are highly heterozygous and do not breed true. In addition, we are looking for rare alleles, so the more plants we try, the better.
- (specifically) To test someone's patience.
- You are trying my patience.
- Don't fucking try me.
- To taste, sample, etc.
- Try this—you’ll love it.
- To prove by experiment; to apply a test to, for the purpose of determining the quality; to examine; to prove; to test.
- to try weights or measures by a standard; to try a person's opinions
- (Can we date this quote by William Shakespeare and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- Let the end try the man.
- (law) To put on trial.
- He was tried and executed.
- 1900, Charles W. Chesnutt, The House Behind the Cedars, Chapter I:
- The murderer, he recalled, had been tried and sentenced to imprisonment for life, but was pardoned by a merciful governor after serving a year of his sentence.
- 1987, Hadi Khorsandi, trans. Ehssan Javan, “It Didn’t Quite Work Out—2” in The Ayatollah and I:
- I sit in front of the mirror and try myself. I am no impartial judge, otherwise I would have had myself executed several times over by now.
- 2017 August 27, Brandon Nowalk, “Game Of Thrones slows down for the longest, and best, episode of the season (newbies)”, in The Onion AV Club[1]:
- Sansa pretends to gather everyone in the great hall to try Arya, and at the last moment reveals she’s actually trying Littlefinger for murder and treason, although I think everyone in that room already knew what was going on except him.
- To make an experiment. Usually followed by a present participle.
- To experiment, to strive.
- To have or gain knowledge of by experience.
- (Can we date this quote by John Dryden and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- Try the Libyan heat or Scythian cold.
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Milton to this entry?)
- (Can we date this quote by John Dryden and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- To work on something.
- You are trying too hard.
- (obsolete) To do; to fare.
- How do you try! (i.e., how do you do?)
- To settle; to decide; to determine; specifically, to decide by an appeal to arms.
- to try rival claims by a duel; to try conclusions
- (Can we date this quote by William Shakespeare and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- Left I the court, to see this quarrel tried.
- (euphemistic, of a couple) To attempt to conceive a child.
- To have or gain knowledge of by experience.
- (nautical) To lie to in heavy weather under just sufficient sail to head into the wind.
- To strain; to subject to excessive tests.
- The light tries his eyes.
- Repeated failures try one's patience.
- (slang, chiefly African-American Vernacular, used with another verb) To want
- I am really not trying to hear you talk about my mama like that.
Usage notes
- (to attempt): This is a catenative verb that takes the to infinitive. Unmarked conjugations can take and instead of to, for which also see Citations:try.
- I'm going to try to distract him. (more formal)
- I'm going to try and distract him. (less formal)
- (to make an experiment): This is a catenative verb that takes the gerund (-ing).
- See Appendix:English catenative verbs
Synonyms
- (to attempt): attempt, endeavor, fand, mint, take a run at, take a stab at
- (to taste, sample, etc): sample, taste
Derived terms
Related terms
Translations
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
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Noun
try (plural tries)
- An attempt.
- I gave unicycling a try but I couldn’t do it.
- An act of tasting or sampling.
- I gave sushi a try but I didn’t like it.
- (rugby) A score in rugby league and rugby union, analogous to a touchdown in American football.
- Today I scored my first try.
- 2011 October 1, Tom Fordyce, “Rugby World Cup 2011: England 16-12 Scotland”, in BBC Sport[2]:
- But two penalties and a drop-goal from Jonny Wilkinson, despite a host of other wayward attempts, plus a late try from Chris Ashton were enough to send a misfiring England through.
- (UK, dialect, obsolete) A screen, or sieve, for grain.
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Holland to this entry?)
- (American football) a field goal or extra point
Synonyms
- (an attempt): bash, go, stab, whirl
- (an act of tasting or sampling): sampling, taste, tasting
- (a score in rugby): touchdown (American football)
- (the point after touchdown): extra point (American football)
Derived terms
Translations
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Etymology 2
Probably from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old French trié.
Adjective
try (comparative more try, superlative most try)
- (obsolete) Fine, excellent.
- 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, V.2:
- But he her suppliant hands, those hands of gold, / And eke her feete, those feete of silver trye, […] Chopt off […].
- 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, V.2:
Anagrams
Cornish
< 2 | 3 | 4 > |
---|---|---|
Cardinal : try | ||
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Proto-Brythonic *tri, from Proto-Celtic *trīs, from Proto-Indo-European *tréyes.
Numeral
try
- (Standard Cornish) three
Related terms
See also
Portuguese
Noun
try m (plural tries)
- try (a score in rugby)
- (programming) try (block of code that may trigger exceptions)
Synonyms
- (rugby score): ensaio
Welsh
Pronunciation
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 159: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value cy-N is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA(key): /trɨː/
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 159: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value cy-S is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA(key): /triː/
Verb
try
Mutation
Welsh mutation | |||
---|---|---|---|
radical | soft | nasal | aspirate |
try | dry | nhry | thry |
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. |
Westrobothnian
Numeral
Lua error in Module:parameters at line 159: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value gmq-bot is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E.
- English 1-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio links
- Rhymes:English/aɪ
- English terms inherited from Middle English
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms derived from Anglo-Norman
- English terms derived from Old French
- English terms derived from Gothic
- English terms derived from Proto-Germanic
- English terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- English lemmas
- English verbs
- English terms with usage examples
- English terms with quotations
- English terms with obsolete senses
- Requests for quotations/Sir T. Elyot
- en:Nautical
- Requests for date/William Shakespeare
- en:Law
- Requests for date/John Dryden
- Requests for quotations/Milton
- English euphemisms
- English slang
- African-American Vernacular English
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- en:Rugby
- British English
- English dialectal terms
- Requests for quotations/Holland
- en:Football (American)
- English adjectives
- English basic words
- English control verbs
- Cornish terms inherited from Proto-Brythonic
- Cornish terms derived from Proto-Brythonic
- Cornish terms inherited from Proto-Celtic
- Cornish terms derived from Proto-Celtic
- Cornish terms inherited from Proto-Indo-European
- Cornish terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- Cornish lemmas
- Cornish numerals
- Portuguese lemmas
- Portuguese nouns
- Portuguese countable nouns
- Portuguese terms spelled with Y
- Portuguese masculine nouns
- pt:Programming
- Welsh terms with IPA pronunciation
- Welsh non-lemma forms
- Welsh verb forms