jag
/d͡ʒæɡ/
jag noun: a sharp projection. Also the ellipsis of jagoff.
Noun (1)
jag (plural jags)
- A sharp projection.
- garments thus beset with long jagges and pursles1659, T[itus] Livius [i.e., Livy], “(please specify the book number)”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Romane Historie […], London: […] W. Hunt, for George Sawbridge, […], →OCLC
- The thick black cloud was cleft, and still / The Moon was at its side; / Like waters shot from some high crag, / The lightning fell with never a jag, / A river steep and wide.1798, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, lines 323–7
- A part broken off; a fragment.
- some Jaggs will ſuffice to be recited1693, John Hacket, Scrinia Reserata
- I depart as air .... I shake my white locks at the runway sun, / I effuse my flesh in eddies and drift it in lacy jags.1855, Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself”, in Leaves of Grass, page 56
- A flap, a tear in a clothing
- A cleft or division.
- A medical injection, a jab.
- A thorn from a bush (see jaggerbush).
Verb
jag (third-person singular simple present jags, present participle jagging, simple past and past participle jagged)
Noun (2)
jag (plural jags)
- Enough liquor to make a person noticeably drunk; a skinful.
- A binge or period of overindulgence; a spree.
- Consider, the pessimists argue, the vast number of plays which it is only possible to sit through with the assistance of what Ella Wheeler Wilcox would call a mild jag.1919 August, P. G. Wodehouse, “Prohibition and the Drama”, in Vanity Fair, page 21
- ‘People who spend their money for second-hand sex jags are as nervous as dowagers who can't find the rest-room.’1939, Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, page 77
- A fit, spell, outburst.
- Of course she did not lose her sense of humor (not necessarily to be confused with her laughing fits, which are crying jags turned inside out according to the shrinks).1985, Peter De Vries, chapter 9, in The Prick of Noon, Penguin, page 165
- Miles had a cold, he always had a cold, it went unnoticed, went without saying, he had coughing jags and slightly woozy eyes, completely unremarked by people who knew him […]1997, Don DeLillo, Underworld, Simon & Schuster, published 2007, Part 4, Chapter 1, p. 396
- A one-horse cart load, or, in modern times, a truck load, of hay or wood.
- A leather bag or wallet; (in the plural) saddlebags.
Noun (3) capitalized: JAG
JAG (countable and uncountable, plural JAGs)
- Acronym of judge advocate general.
- Of the three JAGs who were dismissed, I know Lt. Gen. Charles Plummer and worked with him for more than three years.2025 February 24, Frank Kendall, “America Has a Rogue President”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
Noun (4) capitalized: Jag
Jag (plural Jags)
Also used as
jag is also the ellipsis of jagoff.
jag meaning in Urdu, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada
jag in Urdu
- جگ
jag in Telugu
- జాగ్
jag in Malayalam
- ജഗ്
jag in Kannada
- ಜಾಗ್, ಜಗ್
More languagesFewer languages
- jag in Punjabi
- ਜੱਗ, ਜੈਗ, ਜਗ
- jag in Gujarati
- જગ
Examples of jag in a sentence
- Even if you hadn’t been drowned, you would have been smashed to pieces by the terrible weight of water against the countless jags of rock.1956, C. S. Lewis, chapter 16, in The Last Battle, Collins, published 1998:
- He eventually finished the novel after a 10-day writing jag.2026 April 4, Jonathan Derbyshire, “Lunch with the FT: Jay McInerney”, in FT Weekend (Life & Arts section), London: The Financial Times...
Forms of jag
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | jags |
| plural | JAGs |
| plural | Jags |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | jags |
| present participle | jagging |
| past participle | jagged |
| past | jagged |
Origin of jag
The noun is from late Middle English jagge, from Old English giagga, giacga. The ultimate origin could be sound-symbolic of sudden movement, compare with jam, rag and Middle English dag, of which jag may be a palatalised variant. The verb is from jaggen, from Old English giacgian.
Circa 1597; originally "load of broom or furze", variant of British English dialectal chag (“tree branch; branch of broom or furze”), from Old English ċeacga (“broom, furze”), from Proto-Germanic *kagô (compare dialectal German Kag (“stump, cabbage, stalk”), Swedish dialect kage (“stumps”), Norwegian dialect kage (“low bush”), of unknown origin.
Shortening of Jaguar.
Words formed from jag
Phrases with jag
Words that rhyme with jag
Questions about jag
- What does jag mean?
- Jag means a sharp projection.
- What is jag in Urdu?
- Jag in Urdu is جگ. See Jag meaning in Urdu.
- How do you use jag in a sentence?
- Even if you hadn’t been drowned, you would have been smashed to pieces by the terrible weight of water against the countless jags of rock.
- What part of speech is jag?
- Jag can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce jag?
- Jag is pronounced /d͡ʒæɡ/.
- What is the plural of jag?
- The plural of jag is jags.
Words near jag in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: jag (page history and authors); JAG (page history and authors); Jag (page history and authors); jag (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jag (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jag (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jag (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jag (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jag (Gujarati, 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-jag.wav.
Cite this entry: “jag.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/jag. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.