Noun: a (plural aes)
- The name of the Latin script letter A/a.
Article: a (indefinite)
- One; any indefinite example of; used to denote a singular item of a group. [First attested prior to 1150]There was a man here looking for you yesterday.
- 1992, Rudolf M. Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, page vii
- With fresh material, taxonomic conclusions are leavened by recognition that the material examined reflects the site it occupied; a herbarium packet gives one only a small fraction of the data desirable for sound conclusions. Herbarium material does not, indeed, allow one to extrapolate safely: what you see is what you get […]
- 2005, Emily Kingsley (lyricist), Kevin Clash (voice actor), “A Cookie is a Sometime Food”, Sesame Street, season 36, Sesame Workshop:
- Hoots the Owl: Yes a, fruit, is a [sic], any, time, food!
Verb: a (third-person singular simple present -, present participle -, simple past and past participle -)
- (archaic or slang) Have. [between 1150 and 1350, continued in some use until 1650; used again after 1950]
- I'd a come, if you'd a asked.
- 1604 (facsimile printed between 1830 and 1910), William Shakespeare, Hamlet:
- So would I a done by yonder ſunne
- And thou hadſt not come to my bed.
Pronoun: a
- (obsolete outside England and Scotland dialects) He. [1150-1900]1599, Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, III-ii:
- a’ brushes his hat o’ mornings.
- 1874 Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd (Barnes & Noble Classics reprint [reset], 2005, chapter 5, page 117; from "Hardy's 1912 Wessex edition"):
- "And how Farmer James would cuss, and call thee a fool, wouldn't he, Joseph, when 'a seed his name looking so inside-out-like?" continued Matthew Moon, with feeling. / "Ay — 'a would," said Joseph meekly.
Interjection: a
- A meaningless syllable; ah.
- 1623 Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale, IV-iii:
- A merry heart goes all the day
- Your sad tires in a mile-a
- 1936 Avery, I Love to Singa:
Adverb: a (not comparable)
- (chiefly...