Word.ws English Dictionary

lime

/laɪm/

lime noun: any inorganic material containing calcium, usually calcium oxide (quicklime) or calcium hydroxide (slaked lime). Also the alternative form of lyam.

lime: any inorganic material containing calcium, usually calcium oxide (quicklime) or calcium hydroxide...
Image: Björn Laczay from Moosburg, Germany, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

lime (countable and uncountable, plural limes)

  1. Any inorganic material containing calcium, usually calcium oxide (quicklime) or calcium hydroxide (slaked lime).
    • Lime, which is the product of the burning of chalk or limestone, might be bought ready burnt, or it could be burnt in kilns specially constructed in the neighbourhood of the building operations.1952, L.F. Salzman, Building in England, page 149
  2. (poetic) Any gluey or adhesive substance that traps or captures; sometimes a synonym for birdlime.
    • Monster, come, put some lime upon your fingers, and away with the rest.1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published...
    • Like the lime which foolish birds are caught with.1835, William Wordsworth, They called Thee Merry England, in old time [first line of unnamed poem]
  3. A limelight; any spotlight.
    • Sellers moved on until he was actually trusted to operate the limes, the spotlights that can make or destroy an artist's act.1980, Peter Evans, Peter Sellers: The Mask Behind the Mask, page 30
    • Then out of the blue, a spotlight much like the “limes” in a theatre, lit up what seemed like a Punch and Judy tent […] He struggled even more, when from out of the shadows and into the bright light of the limes, stepped Uncle Jolly.2018, Robert Charles Hines, Twists and Turns: 13 Tales of the Uneasy, page 121

Verb (1)

lime (third-person singular simple present limes, present participle liming, simple past and past participle limed)

  1. (transitive) To treat with calcium hydroxide or calcium oxide (lime).
    • If I were you, I'd lime.1917, Rudyard Kipling, The Land
  2. (transitive) To smear with birdlime.
    1. (rare, transitive) To ensnare, catch, entrap.
      • URSULA. She's lim'd, I warrant you: we have caught her, madam.
        HERO. If it prove so, then loving goes by haps:
        Some Cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.1598–1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “Much Adoe about Nothing”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
      • Abraham, like his parents, seemed to have been limed and caught by the ensnaring inn.1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, volume 1, London: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., page 39
  3. (transitive) To apply limewash.

Noun (2)

lime (countable and uncountable, plural limes)

  1. A deciduous tree of the genus Tilia, especially Tilia × europaea; the linden tree.
    • The linden or lime tree is the favourite haunt of the Elves and cognate beings; and it is not safe to be near it after sunset.1828, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, volume I, London: William Harrison Ainsworth, page 158
    • But there was nothing of an ascetic's expression in her bright full eyes, as she looked before her, not consciously seeing, but absorbing into the intensity of her mood, the solemn glory of the afternoon with its long swathes of light between the far-off rows of limes, whose shadows touched each...1871, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter III, in Middlemarch […], volume I, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book I, page 38
  2. The wood of this tree.

Noun (3)

lime (countable and uncountable, plural limes)

  1. Any of several green citrus fruit, somewhat smaller and sharper-tasting than a lemon.
  2. Any of the trees that bear limes, especially Key lime, Citrus aurantiifolia.
  3. (uncountable) Any of several brilliant, sometimes yellowish, green colours associated with the fruits of a lime tree.
    Synonyms:
    lime green
    1. A particular one of those colours that has been standardized under this name, at least in some organizations' standards.
  4. (slang) A fan fiction story which contains sexual references, but stops short of full, explicit descriptions of sexual activity (coined by analogy with lemon).
    • WARNING: This is a lime. While it does not show explicit sex, as a lemon would, references to sexual situations abound.1998 June 8, Gary Kleppe, “[Ranma][Fanfic] Tangled Web”, in rec.arts.anime.creative (Usenet)
    • Even with all the sex in Garden of EVA, I still think the main stories are better for just being the lemon-scented limes that they are.1998 December 29, jiml...@earthlink.net, “[EVA][FanFic][Lemon] Garden of EVA 0:6x - Wet Dreams Bite!”, in rec.arts.anime.creative (Usenet)

Adjective

lime (not comparable)

  1. Containing lime or lime juice.
  2. Having the aroma or flavor of lime.
  3. Lime-green.

Verb (2)

lime (third-person singular simple present limes, present participle liming, simple past and past participle limed)

  1. (Barbados, Caribbean, Trinidad-and-Tobago, informal) To hang out or socialize in an informal, relaxed environment, especially with friends, for example at a party or on the beach.

Noun (4)

lime (plural limes)

  1. (Caribbean, Trinidad & Tobago) A casual gathering to socialize.

Also used as

lime is also the alternative form of lyam.

lime meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

lime in Hindi

inorganic material containing calcium
चूना cūnā
to treat with lime
चुनाई cunāī

lime in Tamil

green citrus fruit
தேசிக்காய் tēcikkāy

lime in Urdu

چونا, چونے

lime in Bengali

inorganic material containing calcium
চুন cun
More languagesFewer languages
lime in Telugu
సున్నము sunnamu
lime in Malayalam
ചുണ്ണാമ്പ് cuṇṇāmpŭ, കുമ്മായം പൂശുക kummāyaṁ pūśuka, ചെറുനാരങ്ങ ceṟunāraṅṅa, ചെറുനാരകം ceṟunārakaṁ
lime in Kannada
ಸುಣ್ಣ suṇṇa, ಲಿಂಬೆ limbe
lime in Punjabi
ਚੂਨੇ, ਚੂਨਾ, ਲਾਈਮਿੰਗ
lime in Gujarati
ચૂનો, ચૂનું
lime in Odia
ଚୂନ, ଚୂନକୁ, ଚୂନାକୁ
lime in Sanskrit
निम्बू nimbū
lime in Sinhala
දෙහි dehi
lime in Nepali
कागती kāgatī
lime in Tagalog
apog, pirali
lime in Arabic
جِير jīr, لَيْم laym, بَنْزَهِير banzahīr
lime in Malay
kapur
lime in Indonesian
kapur
lime in Persian
آهک âhak, گرچ gerač
lime in Thai
ปูนขาว, มะนาว má-naao
lime in Vietnamese
vôi, chanh
lime in Myanmar
သံပရာ sampa.ra

Examples of lime in a sentence

  • This is a product of lime and nitric acid.
  • I prefer lime ice lollies to lemon ones.
  • Lime-cement mortar is also known as composition or "compo" mortar, guarded or gauged mortar. The mix contains, lime, cement and sand in proportions depending on the requirements of the work.

All 40 example sentences with lime

Synonyms of lime

Forms of lime

Noun
plurallimes
Verb
third-person singular presentlimes
present participleliming
past participlelimed
pastlimed

Plural of lime: limes

Origin of lime

From Middle English lyme, lym, lime, from Old English līm, from Proto-West Germanic *līm, from Proto-Germanic *līmaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂leyH- (“to smear”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian Liem (“glue”), Dutch lijm (“glue”), German Leim (“glue”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish lim (“glue”), Faroese and Icelandic lím (“glue”), Latin limus (“mud”).

Lime (17th c.) and line (16th c.) are alterations of obsolete lind, from Middle English lynde, from Old English lind, from Proto-Germanic *lindijō. The phonetic development is unusual, but it has been suggested that it began in compounds (loss of -d- perhaps before tree, the change to -m- before labials as in bark or wood). Doublet of linden, which see.

Borrowed from French lime, from Spanish lima, from Arabic لِيمَة (līma), from Classical Persian لِیمُو (līmū, līmō), from Sanskrit निम्बू (nimbū, “lime”), ultimately from Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *limaw or Munda. Doublet of lemon.

Words formed from lime

Phrases with lime

23 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with lime

31 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about lime

What does lime mean?
Lime means any inorganic material containing calcium, usually calcium oxide (quicklime) or calcium hydroxide (slaked lime).
What is lime in Hindi?
Lime in Hindi is चूना (cūnā), चुनाई (cunāī). See Lime meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is lime?
Lime can be a noun, a verb or an adjective.
How do you pronounce lime?
Lime is pronounced /laɪm/.
What is the plural of lime?
The plural of lime is limes.

Words near lime in the dictionary

  1. limbus
  2. limbuses
  3. limbward
  4. limby
  5. LIMDIS
  6. lime
  7. lime blossom
  8. lime blossoms
  9. lime burning
  10. lime butterflies
  11. lime butterfly

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lime (page history and authors); lime (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); lime (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); lime (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); lime (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.

Last updated:

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

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