Word.ws English Dictionary

cadge

/kæd͡ʒ/

cadge verb: to tie, fasten.

Verb (1)

cadge (third-person singular simple present cadges, present participle cadging or cadgin, simple past and past participle cadged)

  1. (obsolete, transitive) To tie, fasten.
  2. (Geordie) To beg.
    • Cadging on the fly is a profitable occupation in the vicinity of bathing places, and large towns. A person of this description frequently gets many shillings in the course of the day1839, Glasgow Society, Report for Repressing Juvenile Delinquency
  3. (UK, US, slang) To obtain something by wit or guile; to convince people to do something they might not normally do.
    • Are ye gannin te cadge a lift of yoer fatha?
    • They moved about the bar incessantly, cadging cigarettes and drinks, with something behind their eyes at once terribly vulnerable and terribly hard.1956, James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room, Penguin, published 2001, Part One, Chapter 2

Noun

cadge (plural cadges)

  1. A circular frame on which cadgers carry hawks for sale.

Verb (2)

cadge (third-person singular simple present cadges, present participle cadging or cadgin, simple past and past participle cadged)

  1. To carry hawks and other birds of prey.
    • For quotations using this term, see Citations:cadge.
  2. (Scotland, UK, dialectal) To carry, as a burden.
    • Another Atlas that will cadge a whole world of iniuries without fainting.1607, Thomas Walkington, The Optick Glasse of Humors
  3. (Scotland, UK, dialectal) To hawk or peddle, as fish, poultry, etc.

cadge meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada

cadge in Tamil

ஒட்டுண்ணியாக இரு, இலவசமாகக் கேட்டு வாங்கு, இலவசமாகக் கற, மற்றவரின் தாராளம், நட்பு இவற்றைப் பயன்படுத்து, திருப்பித்தரும் எண்ணமின்றிக் கடன் பெறு

cadge in Urdu

بھیک مانگنا, مفت خوری کرنا

cadge in Malayalam

scrounge, borrow, bum
ഇരന്നുണ്ണുക, ഭിക്ഷ തെണ്ടുക, വല്ലവരുടെയും ഔദാര്യം കൊണ്ടു ജീവിക്കുക, പരാന്നം ഭക്ഷിക്കുക, ഇരന്നുവാങ്ങുക, ഭിക്ഷചോദിക്കുക

cadge in Kannada

ಗೋಗರೆ, ತಿರುಪೆ

Synonyms of cadge

1 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of cadge

Forms of cadge

Verb
third-person singular presentcadges
present participlecadging
present participlecadgin
past participlecadged
pastcadged
Noun
pluralcadges

Origin of cadge

From Middle English caggen (“to tie, fasten, bind”), probably from Old Norse. Compare Old Norse kǫgurr (“quilt”), kǫgurbarn (“swaddled child”).

Likely a corruption of cage.

Words formed from cadge

Words that rhyme with cadge

Questions about cadge

What does cadge mean?
Cadge means to tie, fasten.
What is cadge in Tamil?
Cadge in Tamil is ஒட்டுண்ணியாக இரு, இலவசமாகக் கேட்டு வாங்கு, இலவசமாகக் கற. See Cadge meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is cadge?
Cadge can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce cadge?
Cadge is pronounced /kæd͡ʒ/.
What is the past tense of cadge?
The past tense of cadge is cadged.

Words near cadge in the dictionary

  1. cadevaric
  2. cadew
  3. cadews
  4. cadexomer iodine
  5. Cadfarch
  6. cadge
  7. cadged
  8. Cadgee
  9. cadger
  10. cadgers
  11. cadges

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cadge (page history and authors); cadge (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cadge (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cadge (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); cadge (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-cadge.wav.

Cite this entry: “cadge.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cadge. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.