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Ward   /wɔrd/   Listen
noun
Ward  n.  
1.
The act of guarding; watch; guard; guardianship; specifically, a guarding during the day. See the Note under Watch, n., 1. "Still, when she slept, he kept both watch and ward."
2.
One who, or that which, guards; garrison; defender; protector; means of guarding; defense; protection. "For the best ward of mine honor." "The assieged castle's ward Their steadfast stands did mightily maintain." "For want of other ward, He lifted up his hand, his front to guard."
3.
The state of being under guard or guardianship; confinement under guard; the condition of a child under a guardian; custody. "And he put them in ward in the house of the captain of the guard." "I must attend his majesty's command, to whom I am now in ward." "It is also inconvenient, in Ireland, that the wards and marriages of gentlemen's children should be in the disposal of any of those lords."
4.
A guarding or defensive motion or position, as in fencing; guard. "Thou knowest my old ward; here I lay, and thus I bore my point."
5.
One who, or that which, is guarded. Specifically:
(a)
A minor or person under the care of a guardian; as, a ward in chancery. "You know our father's ward, the fair Monimia."
(b)
A division of a county. (Eng. & Scot.)
(c)
A division, district, or quarter of a town or city. "Throughout the trembling city placed a guard, Dealing an equal share to every ward."
(d)
A division of a forest. (Eng.)
(e)
A division of a hospital; as, a fever ward.
6.
(a)
A projecting ridge of metal in the interior of a lock, to prevent the use of any key which has not a corresponding notch for passing it.
(b)
A notch or slit in a key corresponding to a ridge in the lock which it fits; a ward notch. "The lock is made... more secure by attaching wards to the front, as well as to the back, plate of the lock, in which case the key must be furnished with corresponding notches."
Ward penny (O. Eng. Law), money paid to the sheriff or castellan for watching and warding a castle.
Ward staff, a constable's or watchman's staff. (Obs.)


verb
Ward  v. t.  (past & past part. warded; pres. part. warding)  
1.
To keep in safety; to watch; to guard; formerly, in a specific sense, to guard during the day time. "Whose gates he found fast shut, no living wight To ward the same."
2.
To defend; to protect. "Tell him it was a hand that warded him From thousand dangers."
3.
To defend by walls, fortifications, etc. (Obs.)
4.
To fend off; to repel; to turn aside, as anything mischievous that approaches; usually followed by off. "Now wards a felling blow, now strikes again." "The pointed javelin warded off his rage." "It instructs the scholar in the various methods of warding off the force of objections."


Ward  v. i.  
1.
To be vigilant; to keep guard.
2.
To act on the defensive with a weapon. "She redoubling her blows drove the stranger to no other shift than to ward and go back."


suffix
-wards, -ward  suff.  Suffixes denoting course or direction to; motion or tendency toward; as in backward, or backwards; toward, or towards, etc.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Ward" Quotes from Famous Books



... Sorrow.' Then, recommending him to the care of Rohand, to whom she gave a ring which had belonged to King Mark, her brother, to prove Tristrem's relationship to that prince, she expired, to the intense grief of all her attendants. To secure the safety of his ward, Rohand passed him off as his own child, inverting the form of his name to 'Tremtris.' Duke Morgan now ruled over the land of Ermonie, and Rohand had perforce to pay ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... "Yes, and Laura Ward has played Celia, and is going to have to do it again," stated Clarence. "We can't waste a good dancer like that on ...
— The Wishing-Ring Man • Margaret Widdemer
... take that for it!" And before the brute of a youth could ward off the blow he received Tom's fist in his right eye. Then he got one in the other eye and another in the nose that made the blood spurt freely. He tried to defend himself, but Tom was "fighting mad," and his blows came so rapidly that Koswell was knocked around like a tenpin and ...
— The Rover Boys at College • Edward Stratemeyer
... feyther, Miss Dora. Oh, he wor a bad 'un to me, but he had allus a soft spot for t' lad. I'd be reet glad to send worrud. He wor theer in the ward, they ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... upheld applicable to a nonresident corporation which solicited orders from California purchasers through agents for whom it hired offices in the State and took orders subject to the vendor's approval. In Nelson v. Sears, Roebuck & Company and Nelson v. Montgomery Ward & Company, 312 U.S. 359 and 373 (1941) it was held that a foreign corporation which maintained retail stores in Iowa could be validly required to collect an Iowa use tax in respect of mail orders sent by Iowa purchasers to out-of-state branches of the corporation and filled by direct ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin


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