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Pattern   /pˈætərn/   Listen
noun
Pattern  n.  
1.
Anything proposed for imitation; an archetype; an exemplar; that which is to be, or is worthy to be, copied or imitated; as, a pattern of a machine. "I will be the pattern of all patience."
2.
A part showing the figure or quality of the whole; a specimen; a sample; an example; an instance. "He compares the pattern with the whole piece."
3.
Stuff sufficient for a garment; as, a dress pattern.
4.
Figure or style of decoration; design; as, wall paper of a beautiful pattern.
5.
Something made after a model; a copy. "The patterns of things in the heavens."
6.
Anything cut or formed to serve as a guide to cutting or forming objects; as, a dressmaker's pattern.
7.
(Founding) A full-sized model around which a mold of sand is made, to receive the melted metal. It is usually made of wood and in several parts, so as to be removed from the mold without injuring it.
8.
A recognizable characteristic relationship or set of relationships between the members of any set of objects or actions, or the properties of the members; also, the set having a definable relationship between its members. Note: Various collections of objects or markings are spoken of as a pattern. Thus: the distribution of bomb or shell impacts on a target area, or of bullet holes in a target; a set of traits or actions that appear to be consistent throughout the members of a group or over time within a group, as behavioral pattern, traffic pattern, dress pattern; the wave pattern for a spoken word; the pattern of intensities in a spectrum; a grammatical pattern.
9.
(Gun.) A diagram showing the distribution of the pellets of a shotgun on a vertical target perpendicular to the plane of fire.
10.
The recommended flight path for an airplane to follow as it approaches an airport for a landing. Same as landing pattern.
11.
An image or diagram containing lines, usually horizontal, vertical, and diagonal, sometimes of varying widths, used to test the resolution of an optical instrument or the accuracy of reproduction of image copying or transmission equipment. Same as test pattern.
pattern box, pattern chain, or pattern cylinder (Figure Weaving), devices, in a loom, for presenting several shuttles to the picker in the proper succession for forming the figure.
Pattern card.
(a)
A set of samples on a card.
(b)
(Weaving) One of the perforated cards in a Jacquard apparatus.
Pattern reader, one who arranges textile patterns.
Pattern wheel (Horology), a count-wheel.


verb
Pattern  v. t.  (past & past part. patterned; pres. part. patterning)  
1.
To make or design (anything) by, from, or after, something that serves as a pattern; to copy; to model; to imitate. "(A temple) patterned from that which Adam reared in Paradise."
2.
To serve as an example for; also, to parallel.
To pattern after, to imitate; to follow.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Pattern" Quotes from Famous Books



... the South Seas is all upon one pattern; it is a wide ocean, indeed, but a narrow world: you shall never talk long and not hear the name of Bully Hayes, a naval hero whose exploits and deserved extinction left Europe cold; commerce will be touched on, copra, shell, perhaps cotton or fungus; but in a far-away, ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... smith also sitting by the anvil, and considering the iron work, the vapour of the fire wasteth his flesh, and he fighteth with the heat of the furnace: the noise of the hammer and the anvil is ever in his ears, and his eyes look still upon the pattern of the thing that he maketh; he setteth his mind to finish his work, and watcheth to ...
— Deuteronomical Books of the Bible - Apocrypha • Anonymous
... pattern," suggested Henderson; so it was now Kenrick's turn to shudder at a miserable attempt at a pun, and return Henderson's missile, whereupon he got a hundred lines, which made him ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... away from the banks until they were lost in the distance and from every gully, purling streams flashed their clear waters into the yellow of the river. The banks were blushing with the glory of autumn and vines hung among the trees like curtains of the richest pattern. Game was utterly fearless until frightened away from the water's edge by a blast from the bugle or a shot. A bar was utilized for a camp that night and at ten o'clock next morning, the white tepees of an Indian village were seen, and piles of wood along the river ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... comprehensible, it is necessary to add here that Lord Dudley naturally found many women disposed to reproduce samples of such a delicious pattern. His second masterpiece of this kind was a young girl named Euphemie, born of a Spanish lady, reared in Havana, and brought to Madrid with a young Creole woman of the Antilles, and with all the ruinous tastes of the Colonies, but fortunately married to an old and extremely rich ...
— The Girl with the Golden Eyes • Honore de Balzac


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