Word.ws English Dictionary

mortar

UK/ˈmɔːtə/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Australia/ˈmoːtə/

mortar noun: a mixture of lime or cement, sand and water used for bonding building blocks.

mortar: a mixture of lime or cement, sand and water used for bonding building blocks
Image: Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

mortar (countable and uncountable, plural mortars)

  1. (uncountable) A mixture of lime or cement, sand and water used for bonding building blocks.
    • The holy hearth! If any earthly and material thing, or rather a divine idea embodied in brick and mortar, might be supposed to possess the permanence of moral truth, it was this.1846, Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Fire Worship”, in Mosses from an Old Manse
  2. (countable) A hollow vessel used to pound, crush, rub, grind or mix ingredients with a pestle.
  3. (countable, historical) A short, heavy, large-bore cannon designed for indirect fire at very steep trajectories.
  4. (countable) A relatively lightweight, often portable indirect fire weapon which transmits recoil to a base plate and is designed to lob explosive shells at very steep trajectories.
  5. (countable) In paper milling, a trough in which material is hammered.

Verb

mortar (third-person singular simple present mortars, present participle mortaring, simple past and past participle mortared)

  1. (transitive) To use mortar or plaster to join two things together.
  2. (transitive) To pound in a mortar.
  3. To fire a mortar (weapon).
  4. To attack (someone or something) using a mortar (weapon).
    • The insurgents snuck up close and mortared the base last night.

mortar meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

mortar in Hindi

mixture of lime or cement, sand and water
मसाला masālā
vessel used to grind ingredients
ओखली okhlī

mortar in Tamil

mixture of lime or cement, sand and water
காரை kārai
vessel used to grind ingredients
கல்வம் kalvam, உரல் ural

mortar in Marathi

मोर्टार

mortar in Urdu

vessel used to grind ingredients
اوکھلی okhlī
More languagesFewer languages
mortar in Bengali
হামানদিস্তা, মর্টার, মশলা
mortar in Telugu
గానుగరోలు gānugarōlu
mortar in Malayalam
ചുണ്ണാമ്പുചാന്ത്, കുമ്മായം, ഉരൽ
mortar in Kannada
ಒರಳು, ತಿರುವು ಕಲ್ಲು, ಕುಟ್ಟಣಿ, ಗಾರೆ
mortar in Punjabi
ਮੋਰਟਾਰ, ਮਾਰਟਰ, ਮੋਰ੍ਟਾਰ
mortar in Gujarati
ખાંડણિયો khā̃ḍṇiyo, હાવન hāvan
mortar in Odia
ମୋର୍ଟାର, ମର୍ଟାର, ମର୍ଟାର୍
mortar in Sanskrit
उलूखल ulū́khala
mortar in Assamese
খুন্দনা khundona
mortar in Nepali
मोर्टार, मर्टार, मोर्टरिंग
mortar in Tagalog
lusong
mortar in Arabic
مِلَاط milāṭ, هَاوُن hāwun, مِهْرَاس mihrās, جُرْن jurn
mortar in Malay
lesung
mortar in Indonesian
mortar, spesi, cobek, mortir
mortar in Persian
ملات malât, ساروج sâruj, هاون hâvan
mortar in Thai
ปูน bpuun, ครก krók, โกร่ง gròong, ปืนครก bpʉʉn-krók
mortar in Vietnamese
vữa, cối

Examples of mortar in a sentence

  • I've had the cracks in the wall stopped with mortar by the builders.
  • There's not nearly enough mortar for thirty-two square metres of wall.
  • A rain of mortar fire fell on our trenches.

All 40 example sentences with mortar

Synonyms of mortar

Forms of mortar

Noun
pluralmortars
alternative form (archaic)morter
Verb
third-person singular presentmortars
present participlemortaring
past participlemortared
pastmortared

Plural of mortar: mortars

Origin of mortar

From Middle English morter, from Old French mortier, from Latin mortārium. Doublet of mortarium.

Words formed from mortar

Phrases with mortar

Words that rhyme with mortar

1 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about mortar

What does mortar mean?
Mortar means a mixture of lime or cement, sand and water used for bonding building blocks.
What is mortar in Hindi?
Mortar in Hindi is मसाला (masālā), ओखली (okhlī). See Mortar meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is mortar?
Mortar can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce mortar?
Mortar is pronounced /ˈmɔːtə/ (UK).
What is the plural of mortar?
The plural of mortar is mortars.

Words near mortar in the dictionary

  1. mortallest
  2. mortalls
  3. mortally
  4. mortalness
  5. mortals
  6. mortar
  7. mortar and pestle
  8. mortar hoe
  9. mortar hoes
  10. Mortara
  11. mortarboard

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: mortar (page history and authors); mortar (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); mortar (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); గానుగరోలు (Telugu) (page history and authors); mortar (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); mortar (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); mortar (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ખાંડણિયો (Gujarati) (page history and authors); mortar (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); उलूखल (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); mortar (Nepali, 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: En-us-mortar.ogg.

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