the Ashes
the Ashes proper noun: a trophy played for by England and Australia in Test cricket; in the form of a small urn containing the ashes of a cremated cricket stump or set of bails.
Proper noun
the Ashes
- A trophy played for by England and Australia in Test cricket; in the form of a small urn containing the ashes of a cremated cricket stump or set of bails.
- A series of Test cricket matches played between England and Australia.
- Australia retained the most recent Ashes series drawing against England 2-2.
- A nominal trophy contested by England and Australia in other sports, especially rugby league.
- A series of such test matches.
Origin of the Ashes
From a satirical obituary published in an English newspaper after its loss to Australia in 1882, announcing the death of English cricket and that "the body would be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia".
Questions about the Ashes
- What does the Ashes mean?
- The Ashes means a trophy played for by England and Australia in Test cricket; in the form of a small urn containing the ashes of a cremated cricket stump or set of bails.
- What part of speech is the Ashes?
- The Ashes is a proper noun.
Words near the Ashes in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: the Ashes (page history and authors). 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: en-au-the Ashes.ogg.
Cite this entry: “the Ashes.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/the_ashes. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.