quay
UK/kiː/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Ireland/keɪ/
quay noun: a stone or concrete structure on navigable water used for loading and unloading vessels; a wharf. Also the alternative spelling of qway.
Noun
quay (plural quays)
- A stone or concrete structure on navigable water used for loading and unloading vessels; a wharf.
- moor up in the quay
- […] its harbour was filled with stately ships; and its quays, swarming with foreign traders and loaded with bales of costly merchandise[…]1879, F. D. Morice, Pindar, chapter 10, pp. 166-167
Verb
quay (third-person singular simple present quays, present participle quaying, simple past and past participle quayed)
- To land or tie up at a quay or similar structure, especially used in the phrase "quay up".
Proper noun capitalized: Quay
Quay
- A surname.
Also used as
quay is also the alternative spelling of qway.
quay meaning in Hindi, Bengali, Telugu and Kannada
quay in Hindi
- कुवे
quay in Bengali
- কুয়ে
quay in Telugu
- క్వె
quay in Kannada
- ಕ್ವೆ
More languagesFewer languages
- quay in Gujarati
- ક્વે
- quay in Odia
- କ୍ୱେ
- quay in Sanskrit
- घट्ट ghaṭṭa
- quay in Tagalog
- pantalan
- quay in Arabic
- رَصِيف الْمِينَاء raṣīf al-mīnāʔ
- quay in Malay
- dermaga, jeti
- quay in Indonesian
- dermaga
- quay in Vietnamese
- ke, bờ xây
Examples of quay in a sentence
- We were pooped within hailing of the quay and were nearly sunk.
- Fortunately, there were staples in the quay wall, and she was able to climb out of the water.
- The quay teemed chock-a-block with porters, officials, clumps of overcoated people under umbrellas.
Forms of quay
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | quays |
| alternative form (obsolete) | cay |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | quays |
| present participle | quaying |
| past participle | quayed |
| past | quayed |
| Adjective | |
| comparative | quayer |
| superlative | quayest |
| Adverb | |
| comparative | quayer |
| superlative | quayest |
Origin of quay
The current spelling replaced the spelling key in the 1690s to emulate the spelling but (at least originally) not the pronunciation of the equivalent modern French quai. From Middle English kay, key, kaye, keye, from Old French kay, cail, from Gaulish *kagyum, cagiíun (“enclosure”), from Proto-Celtic *kagyom (“pen, enclosure”) (compare Welsh cae (“field”)), from Proto-Indo-European *kagʰyóm (“enclosure”). Doublet of hedge and hey (“choreographic figure”).
Words formed from quay
Phrases with quay
Words that rhyme with quay
Questions about quay
- What does quay mean?
- Quay means a stone or concrete structure on navigable water used for loading and unloading vessels; a wharf.
- What is quay in Hindi?
- Quay in Hindi is कुवे. See Quay meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is quay?
- Quay can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce quay?
- Quay is pronounced /kiː/ (UK).
- What is the plural of quay?
- The plural of quay is quays.
Words near quay in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: quay (page history and authors); Quay (page history and authors); quay (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); quay (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); quay (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); quay (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); quay (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); quay (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: En-us-quay.ogg, En-au-quay.ogg.
Cite this entry: “quay.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/quay. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.