Adjacent Words

Surd definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

SURD, a. [L. surdus, deaf.] Deaf; not having the sense of hearing. [Not used.]
1. Upheard. [Not used.]
2. Designating a quantity whose root cannot be exactly expressed in numbers.
SURD, n. In algebra, a quantity whose root cannot be exactly expressed in numbers. Thus 2 is a surd number, because there is no number which multiplied into itself, will exactly produce 2.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: produced without vibration of the vocal cords; "unvoiced consonants such as `p' and `k' and `s'" [syn: unvoiced, voiceless, surd, hard] [ant: soft, sonant, voiced] n
1: a consonant produced without sound from the vocal cords [syn: surd, voiceless consonant]

Merriam Webster's

I. adjective Etymology: Latin surdus deaf, silent, stupid Date: 1610 1. lacking sense ; irrational <surd conceits of scripture's sense — Thomas Jackson> 2. voiceless — used of speech sounds II. noun Date: 1557 1. a. an irrational root (as ?3) b. irrational number 2. a surd speech sound

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. & n. --adj. 1 Math. (of a number) irrational. 2 Phonet. (of a sound) uttered with the breath and not the voice (e.g. f, k, p, s, t). --n. 1 Math. a surd number, esp. the root of an integer. 2 Phonet. a surd sound. Etymology: L surdus deaf, mute: sense 1 by mistransl. into L of Gk alogos irrational, speechless, through Arab. jadr asamm deaf root

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Surd Surd, a. [L. surdus deaf (whence the meaning, deaf to reason, irrational), perhaps akin to E. swart. Cf. Sordine.] 1. Net having the sense of hearing; deaf. [Obs.] ``A surd . . . generation.'' --Sir T. Browne. 2. Unheard. [Obs.] --Kenrick. 3. (Math.) Involving surds; not capable of being expressed in rational numbers; radical; irrational; as, a surd expression or quantity; a surd number. 4. (Phonetics) Uttered, as an element of speech, without tone, or proper vocal sound; voiceless; unintonated; nonvocal; atonic; whispered; aspirated; sharp; hard, as f, p, s, etc.; -- opposed to sonant. See Guide to Pronunciation, [sect][sect]169, 179, 180.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Surd Surd, n. (Math.) 1. A quantity which can not be expressed by rational numbers; thus, [root]2 is a surd. 2. (Phon.) A surd element of speech. See Surd, a., 4.

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. (Math.) Radical, incommensurable. 2. (Orthoepy.) Aspirate, toneless, unintonated, atonic, unheard, without vocality, pronounced with a simple breathing.

Moby Thesaurus

Gaussian integer, accented, algebraic number, algorismic, algorithmic, aliquot, allophone, alveolar, apical, apico-alveolar, apico-dental, articulated, articulation, aspiration, assimilated, assimilation, back, barytone, bilabial, broad, cacuminal, cardinal, cardinal number, central, cerebral, check, checked, close, complex number, consonant, consonantal, continuant, deaf, deaf and dumb, deaf-eared, deaf-mute, deafened, decimal, defective number, dental, differential, digital, diphthong, dissimilated, dissimilation, dorsal, dull-eared, earless, epenthetic vowel, even, even number, explosive, exponential, figural, figurate, figurative, finite, finite number, flat, fraction, fractional, front, glide, glossal, glottal, glottalization, guttural, hard, hard of hearing, heavy, high, imaginary, imaginary number, impair, impossible, infinite, infinity, integer, integral, intonated, irrational, irrational number, labial, labialization, labiodental, labiovelar, laryngeal, lateral, lax, light, lingual, liquid, logarithmic, logometric, low, manner of articulation, mid, mixed number, modification, monophthong, monophthongal, morphophoneme, mute, muted, narrow, nasal, nasalized, negative, numeral, numerary, numerative, numeric, occlusive, odd, open, ordinal, oxytone, pair, palatal, palatalized, parasitic vowel, peak, pharyngeal, pharyngealization, pharyngealized, phone, phoneme, phonemic, phonetic, phonic, pitch, pitched, plosive, polygonal number, positive, possible, posttonic, prime, prime number, prothetic vowel, pure imaginary, radical, rational, rational number, real, real number, reciprocal, rectangular number, retroflex, round number, rounded, segmental phoneme, semivowel, serial number, soft, sonant, sonority, speech sound, stone-deaf, stop, stopped, stressed, strong, stunned, submultiple, syllabic, syllabic nucleus, syllabic peak, syllable, tense, thick, thick of hearing, throaty, tonal, tone-deaf, tonic, transcendental, transcendental number, transfinite number, transition sound, triphthong, twangy, unaccented, unhearing, unrounded, unstressed, velar, vocable, vocalic, vocoid, voice, voiced, voiced sound, voiceless, voiceless sound, voicing, vowel, vowellike, weak, whole number, wide, word-deaf