Word.ws English Dictionary

ram

UK/ɹæm/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

British/ɹam/

ram noun: a male sheep, typically uncastrated. Also the alternative form of rambo.

ram: a male sheep, typically uncastrated
Image: Naturpuur, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

ram (plural rams)

  1. A male sheep, typically uncastrated.
  2. A battering ram; a heavy object used for breaking through doors.
    • The solid oak door—he fingered it again—was as though made to resist a ram, the walls built to withstand a siege, and every stone and brick in wall, bench, or floor was as immovable as the face of a rock.1934, Ernest Bramah, The Bravo of London
  3. (historical) A warship intended to sink other ships by ramming them.
    • About a couple of miles out lay an ironclad very low in the water, almost, to my brother's perception, like a water-logged ship. This was the ram Thunder Child.1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, page 178
  4. (historical) A reinforced section of the bow of a warship, intended to be used for ramming other ships.
  5. A piston powered by hydraulic pressure.
  6. An act of ramming.
  7. A weight which strikes a blow, in a ramming device such as a pile driver, steam hammer, or stamp mill.
    • He describes the operation thus: "The heavy ram employed to impart the finishing strokes, hoisted up with double purchase and snail's pace to the summit of the Piling Engine, and then falling down like a thunderbolt on the head of the devoted timber, driving it perhaps a single half inch in to the...1952 July, W. R. Watson, “Sankey Viaduct and Embankment”, in Railway Magazine, page 487

Verb

ram (third-person singular simple present rams, present participle ramming, simple past and past participle rammed)

  1. (ambitransitive) To collide with (an object), usually with the intention of damaging it or disabling its function.
    • The man, driving an SUV, then rammed the gate, according to police.
    • A large stone rammed her head2014, Maxine Hong Kingston, The Woman Warrior, Pan Macmillan
  2. (transitive) To strike (something) hard, especially with an implement.
    • To build a sturdy fence, you have to ram the posts deep into the ground.
  3. (transitive) To seat a cartridge, projectile, or propellant charge in the breech of a firearm by pushing or striking.
    • After placing the cartridge in the musket, ram it down securely with the ramrod.
  4. (also, figuratively, transitive) To force, cram or thrust (someone or something) into or through something.
    • I quickly rammed another charge down the barrel and took aim.
    • Again: great to take lessons in ethics from a guy currently trying to ram through a policy of freighting refugees off to cuddly Rwandan president Paul Kagame.2023 July 4, Marina Hyde, “Who’s for political Bazball with Rishi? Voters? Tories? Anyone?”, in The Guardian
  5. (transitive) To fill or compact by pounding or driving.
    • They rammed the earth walls to make them more compact
  6. (slang) To thrust during sexual intercourse.
    • like feel a soft butt against their pelvis or ram a girl really hard with piston-like speed while she begs and screams for more1999, Mr.Web, Size Matters review by mr. web review Group: rec.arts.movies.erotica

Adjective

ram (comparative more ram, superlative most ram)

  1. (Northern England) Rancid; offensive in smell or taste.

Noun (2) capitalized: RAM

RAM (plural RAMs)

  1. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of random-access memory.
    • Looking for the best RAM for your PC in 2023 has gotten a little bit more complicated than before. With the advent of DDR5, you can now choose between a newer standard, and an older one. DDR4 has a differently keyed connector, and you’re also going to have to check that the RAM is compatible with...2023 March 7, Joel Loynds, “Best RAM for gaming in 2023: DDR4, DDR5 & more”, in Dexerto
  2. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of random-access machine.
  3. (abbreviation, acronym, physical) Acronym of relative atomic mass; sometimes styled r.a.m..
  4. (abbreviation, acronym, project management) Acronym of responsibility assignment matrix.
  5. (abbreviation, acronym, risk management) Acronym of reliability availability maintainability.
  6. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of radar-absorbent material, a material which absorbs radar.

Proper noun (1) capitalized: RAM

RAM

  1. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Royal Academy of Music.
  2. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Rise Above Movement.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Ram

the Ram

  1. The constellation and zodiac sign Aries.
    • Aries, or the Ram governeth the head.1668, ‘Godfridus’, The Knowledge of Things Unknown, London: G.P. for G. Sawbridge, page 19
    • Those stars said to belong to the Ram might as well be supposed to belong to the Bull or the Lion.1862, [Frances Rolleston], Mazzaroth, or, The Constellations, London: Rivingtons, page 15
  2. (UK) Someone connected with Derby County Football Club, as a fan, player, coach etc.

Proper noun (3) capitalized: Ram

Ram

  1. The father of Amminadab and the son of Hezron.
  2. A male given name.
  3. A surname
  4. One of the two progenitors of the second generation of humans in Mandaeism.

Noun (3) capitalized: Ram

Ram (plural Rams)

  1. A US Korean War anti-tank weapon.

Proper noun (4) capitalized: Ram

Ram

  1. (alternative) Alternative form of Rāma (“an incarnation of the god Vishnu in Hinduism”).

Also used as

ram is also the alternative form of rambo.

ram meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

ram in Hindi

male sheep
मेंढ़ा mẽṛhā, भेड़ा bheṛā, मेष meṣ

ram in Tamil

ராம், ராமர்

ram in Marathi

राम, रॅम

ram in Urdu

رام
More languagesFewer languages
ram in Bengali
রাম, র্যাম, রামের কাছে
ram in Telugu
పొట్టేలు poṭṭēlu
ram in Malayalam
റാം, റം, റാമിലേക്ക്
ram in Kannada
ರಾಮ್, ರಾಮ್ಗೆ
ram in Punjabi
ਰਾਮ, ਰੈਮ
ram in Gujarati
રામ, રેમ, રામને
ram in Odia
ରାମ, ରାମ୍, ରାମକୁ
ram in Sanskrit
उरण uraṇa
ram in Nepali
राम, र्याम
ram in Arabic
كَبْش kabš
ram in Persian
قوچ quč, تکل tekel, راک râk
ram in Vietnamese
cừu đực
ram in Myanmar
သိုးထီး sui:hti:
Kashmiri
کَٹھ kaṭh

Examples of ram in a sentence

  • Two snatch thieves who snatched a woman's bag experienced swift karma when their victim accidentally rammed into their motorcycle.2016 December 29, M. Kumar, “Snatch thieves accidentally rammed by victim”, in The Star, Malaysia:
  • The other ships, either not caring or too badly-damaged to do anything about it, proceed on their mission, with König the last to fall silent, shot to pieces in a last attempt to ram the Bellerophon.2018 October 17, Drachinifel, 25:35 from the start, in Last Ride of the High Seas Fleet - Battle of Texel 1918, archived from the original...

All 40 example sentences with ram

Forms of ram

Noun
pluralrams
pluralRAMs
pluralRams
Verb
third-person singular presentrams
present participleramming
past participlerammed
pastrammed
Adjective
comparativemore ram
superlativemost ram

Past tense of ram: rammed

Plural of ram: rams

Origin of ram

From Middle English ram, rom, ramme, from Old English ramm (“ram”), from Proto-Germanic *rammaz (“ram”), possibly from *rammaz (“strong”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian Rom (“ram”), Dutch ram (“a male sheep”), German Ramm, Ramme (“ram”). Possibly akin also to Danish ram (“sharp; acrid; rank”), Swedish ram (“strong; perfect”), Faroese ramur (“strong; competent”), Icelandic rammur (“strong; sturdy”).

From Middle English rammen, from the noun (see above). Compare Old High German rammen.

Likely from Old Norse ramr, rammr (“strong, rank, bitter”), from Proto-Germanic *rammaz (“strong, overbearing; acrid, rank”), perhaps ultimately related to Etymology 1 above. Compare Scots ram (“a rank odour”). Compare also Middle English rammish (“rank, offensive in smell”).

Words formed from ram

Phrases with ram

13 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with ram

47 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about ram

What does ram mean?
Ram means a male sheep, typically uncastrated.
What is ram in Hindi?
Ram in Hindi is मेंढ़ा (mẽṛhā), भेड़ा (bheṛā), मेष (meṣ). See Ram meaning in Hindi.
How do you use ram in a sentence?
Two snatch thieves who snatched a woman's bag experienced swift karma when their victim accidentally rammed into their motorcycle.
What part of speech is ram?
Ram can be a noun, a verb, an adjective or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce ram?
Ram is pronounced /ɹæm/ (UK).
What is the plural of ram?
The plural of ram is rams.

Words near ram in the dictionary

  1. Ralstonism
  2. ralstonite
  3. Ralstons
  4. raltegravir
  5. raltitrexed
  6. ram
  7. ram air turbine
  8. ram air turbines
  9. ram bow
  10. ram bows
  11. ram cichlid

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ram (page history and authors); RAM (page history and authors); Ram (page history and authors); ram (Tamil, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ram (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-ram.ogg.

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