Word.ws English Dictionary

cuff

/kʌf/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Australia/kɐf/

cuff noun: glove; mitten.

Noun (1)

cuff (plural cuffs)

  1. (obsolete) Glove; mitten
  2. The end of a shirt sleeve that covers the wrist.
  3. The end of a pants leg when folded up.
  4. A surgical procedure in which parts of the body that were not previously connected are stitched together.

Verb (1)

cuff (third-person singular simple present cuffs, present participle cuffing, simple past and past participle cuffed)

  1. (transitive) To furnish with cuffs.

Noun (2)

cuff (plural cuffs)

  1. (informal, plural, plural-only) A handcuff.

Verb (2)

cuff (third-person singular simple present cuffs, present participle cuffing, simple past and past participle cuffed)

  1. (transitive) To handcuff.
  2. (slang, transitive) To enter into a committed romantic relationship with (someone).
    • cuffing season
    • This fr how it be, never cuffing another Latina woman from New York ever again💀2023 April 3, @SoraWasntHere, Twitter, archived from the original on 23 Aug 2024

Verb (3)

cuff (third-person singular simple present cuffs, present participle cuffing, simple past and past participle cuffed)

  1. (transitive) To hit, as a reproach, particularly with the open palm to the head; to slap.
    • I swear I'll cuff you, if you strike again.c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
    • [They] with their quills did all the hurt they could, / And cuff'd the tender chickens from their food.1687, [John Dryden], “(please specify the page number)”, in The Hind and the Panther. A Poem, in Three Parts, 2nd edition, London: […] Jacob Tonson […], →OCLC
  2. (intransitive) To fight; to scuffle; to box.
    • While the peers cuff to make the rabble sport.1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, John Dryden, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Eighth Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into English Verse. […]...
  3. To buffet.
    • cuffed by the gale1855, Alfred Tennyson, “Maud”, in Maud, and Other Poems, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 24

Noun (3)

cuff (plural cuffs)

  1. A blow, especially with the open hand; a box; a slap.
    • The Sarazin sore daunted with the buffe / Snatcheth his sword, and fiercely to him flies; / Who well it wards, and quyteth cuff with cuff:1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto II”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 17
    • many a bitter kick and cuff1662 (indicated as 1663), [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678; republished...

Noun (4)

cuff (plural cuffs)

  1. (Scotland) The scruff of the neck.

Proper noun capitalized: Cuff

Cuff (plural Cuffs)

  1. A surname.

cuff meaning in Tamil, Marathi, Urdu and Bengali

cuff in Tamil

சட்டையின் முன்கைப்பகுதி, கைப்பட்டை, கட்டும் பட்டை, சுற்றுப்பட்டை

cuff in Marathi

कफ

cuff in Urdu

کف

cuff in Bengali

শার্টের হাতার শেষ অংশ, কাফ, হাততালি
More languagesFewer languages
cuff in Malayalam
മുഷ്ടിപ്രഹരം, കുപ്പായക്കൈയുടെ അറ്റം, ഇടി, കൈ നിവർത്തി അടിക്കുക
cuff in Kannada
ಗುಮ್ಮು, ಗುದ್ದು
cuff in Punjabi
ਕਫ਼, ਕੱਫ, ਕਫ
cuff in Odia
କଫ୍
cuff in Tagalog
punyos
cuff in Malay
cekak
cuff in Indonesian
manset

Examples of cuff in a sentence

  • If your promiscuous, men who know females just date around could take advantage of that, plus a lot wouldn't want to cuff a female they know isn't doing pure things.2023 December 14, u/No-Spot2923, “What exactly makes a woman only good enough for sex and flings but not actual commitment?”, in Reddit...
  • It wasn't too long of that before I naturally got cuffed and I'm happy in a relationship but got damn I do wish I had more time happy and single2024 March 11, u/MobyDukakis, “Being happy single is not celebrated half as much as being a happy couple.”, in Reddit, r/Showerthoughts...
  • Whenever one of my boys cuffs a girl from the club, all I can do is chuckle and shake my head.2024 May 23, @CzarCule, Twitter, archived from the original on 23 Aug 2024:

All 40 example sentences with cuff

Forms of cuff

Noun
pluralcuffs
Verb
third-person singular presentcuffs
present participlecuffing
past participlecuffed
pastcuffed
Proper noun
pluralCuffs
alternative formCuffe

Past tense of cuff: cuffed

Plural of cuff: cuffs

Origin of cuff

From Middle English cuffe, coffe (“glove, mitten”), of obscure origin. Perhaps from Old English cuffie (“hood, cap”), from Medieval Latin cofia, cofea, cuffa, cuphia (“helmet, headdress, hood, cap”), from Frankish *kuf(f)ja (“headdress”), from Proto-West Germanic *kuffju, from Proto-Germanic *kupjō (“cap”). Cognate with Middle High German kupfe (“cap”).

Clipping of handcuff.

1520, “to hit”, apparently of North Germanic origin, from Norwegian kuffa (“to push, shove”) or Swedish kuffa (“to knock, thrust, strike”), from the Proto-Germanic base *skuf- (skuƀ), from Proto-Indo-European *skewbʰ-, see also Lithuanian skùbti (“to hurry”), Polish skubać (“to pluck”), Albanian humb (“to lose”). Germanic cognates include Low German kuffen (“to box the ears”), German kuffen (“to thrash”). More at scuff, shove, scuffle.

Words formed from cuff

Phrases with cuff

Words that rhyme with cuff

27 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about cuff

What does cuff mean?
Cuff means glove; mitten.
What is cuff in Tamil?
Cuff in Tamil is சட்டையின் முன்கைப்பகுதி, கைப்பட்டை, கட்டும் பட்டை. See Cuff meaning in Tamil.
How do you use cuff in a sentence?
If your promiscuous, men who know females just date around could take advantage of that, plus a lot wouldn't want to cuff a female they know isn't doing pure things.
What part of speech is cuff?
Cuff can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce cuff?
Cuff is pronounced /kʌf/ (UK).
What is the plural of cuff?
The plural of cuff is cuffs.

Words near cuff in the dictionary

  1. Cueva
  2. Cuevas
  3. Cuevases
  4. cuevavirus
  5. cuevaviruses
  6. cuff
  7. cuff link
  8. cuff links
  9. cuff on the ear
  10. cuff out
  11. cuff the carrot

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cuff (page history and authors); Cuff (page history and authors); cuff (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cuff (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cuff (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cuff (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cuff (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cuff (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cuff (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cuff (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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-cuff.wav.

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