passage

Borrowed into Middle English from Old French passage, from passer (“to pass”).

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈpæsɪd͡ʒ/

• Audio (GA)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: pass‧age
• Rhymes: -æsɪdʒ

passage (plural passages)

1. A paragraph or section of text or music with particular meaning.

   passage of scripture

   She struggled to play the difficult passages.

2. Part of a path or journey.

   He made his passage through the trees carefully, mindful of the stickers.

3. An incident or episode.
   • 1961, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Foreign Affairs, Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act of 1961: Hearings:

     But there are those who do not feel that the sordid passages of life should be kept off the stage. It is a matter of opinion.

4. The official approval of a bill or act by a parliament. [from 17th c.]

   The company was one of the prime movers in lobbying for the passage of the act.

5. The advance of time.

   Synonym: passing

   • 2011, Roy F. Baumeister, John Tierney, Willpower, →ISBN, page 209:

     The passage of decades has not erased the value of parental monitoring.

6. (art) The use of tight brushwork to link objects in separate spatial plains. Commonly seen in Cubist works.
7. A passageway or corridor.
8. (nautical) A strait or other narrow waterway.

   the Northwest Passage

9. (caving) An underground cavity, formed by water or falling rocks, which is much longer than it is wide.
10. (euphemistic) The vagina.
    • 1986, Bertrice Small, A Love for All Time‎, New American Library, →ISBN, page 463:

      With a look of triumph that he was unable to keep from his dark eyes he slid into her passage with one smooth thrust, […]

    • 1987, Usha Sarup, Expert Lovemaking, Jaico Publishing House, →ISBN, page 53:

      This way, the tip of your penis will travel up and down her passage.

    • 2009, Cat Lindler, Kiss of a Traitor, Medallion Press, →ISBN, page 249:

      At the same moment, Aidan plunged two fingers deep into her passage and broke through her fragile barrier.

11. The act of passing; movement across or through.
    • 1886, Pacific medical journal, volume 29:

      He claimed that he felt the passage of the knife through the ilio-cæcal valve, from the very considerable pain which it caused.

12. The right to pass from one place to another.
13. A fee paid for passing or for being conveyed between places.
14. (bacteriology, virology) Serial passage.
15. (dice games, historical) A gambling game for two players using three dice, in which the object is to throw a double over ten. [from 15th c.]

passage (third-person singular simple present passages, present participle passaging, simple past and past participle passaged)

1. (medicine) To pass something, such as a pathogen or stem cell, through a host or medium.

   He passaged the virus through a series of goats.

   After 24 hours, the culture was passaged to an agar plate.

2. (rare) To make a passage, especially by sea; to cross.

   They passaged to America in 1902.

passage (not comparable)

1. (falconry, attributive) Of a bird: Less than a year old but living on its own, having left the nest.

   Passage red-tailed hawks are preferred by falconers because these younger birds have not yet developed the adult behaviors which would make them more difficult to train.

From French passager, from Italian passeggiare.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈpasɑːʒ/

passage (plural passages)

1. (dressage) A movement in classical dressage, in which the horse performs a very collected, energetic, and elevated trot that has a longer period of suspension between each foot fall than a working trot.

passage (third-person singular simple present passages, present participle passaging, simple past and past participle passaged)

1. (intransitive, dressage) To execute a passage movement.
   • 1915, Cunninghame Graham, Hope‎, page 18:

     After a spring or two, the horse passaged and reared, and lighting on a flat slab of rock which cropped up in the middle of the road, slipped sideways and fell with a loud crash […]

• “passage”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “passage”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “passage”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

From Middle Dutch passage, from Middle French passage, from Old French passage. Equivalent to passeren +‎ -age.

• IPA^(key): /ˌpɑˈsaː.ʒə/

• audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: pas‧sa‧ge
• Rhymes: -aːʒə

passage f (plural passages, diminutive passagetje n)

1. A passage, a stage of a journey.
2. A passageway, a corridor, a narrow route.
3. A paragraph or section of text with particular meaning.
4. a passage way in a city, especially a roofed shopping street.

   Synonym: winkelpassage

• ecopassage
• faunapassage

• → Indonesian: pasasê

• IPA^(key): /pa.saʒ/, /pɑ.saʒ/

• Audio (France, Paris)

  (file)

• Homophones: passagent, passages
• Rhymes: -aʒ

From Old French, from passer +‎ -age.

passage m (plural passages)

1. the act of going through a place or event
2. the time when such an act occurs
3. (uncountable) Circulation, traffic, movement
4. (astronomy) Moment when a star or planet occults another, or crosses a meridian
5. a short stay
6. a trip or travel, especially by boat
7. the act of going from a state to another
8. graduation from a school year
9. the act of making something undergo a process
10. the act of handing something to someone
11. an access way
12. a laid out way allowing to go across something
13. an alley or alleyway off-limits to cars
14. a paragraph or section of text or music

• → Czech: pasáž
• → German: Passage
• → Polish: pasaż
• → Portuguese: passagem
• → Romanian: pasaj
• → Russian: пасса́ж (passáž)
• → Turkish: pasaj

Verb form of passager.

passage

1. inflection of passager:
   1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
   2. second-person singular imperative

• “passage”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

passage oblique singular, m (oblique plural passages, nominative singular passages, nominative plural passage)

1. passage (part of a route or journey)
   • c. 1180, Chrétien de Troyes, Lancelot ou le Chevalier de la charrette:

     Volez que je vos die gierres
     Del passage com il est max ?

     Do you want me to tell you
     Of the passage, how bad it is?

• Middle French: passage
  • → Middle Dutch: passage
    • Dutch: passage
      • → Indonesian: pasasê
  • French: passage
    • → Czech: pasáž
    • → German: Passage
    • → Polish: pasaż
    • → Portuguese: passagem
    • → Romanian: pasaj
    • → Russian: пасса́ж (passáž)
    • → Turkish: pasaj
• → Middle Armenian: բասաճ (basač)
• → Middle English: passage
  • English: passage
• → Irish: pasáiste
• → Swedish: passage

From Old French passage, from passer (“to pass”).

• IPA^(key): /paˈsɑːʂ/, /paˈsɑːɧ/

passage c

1. a passage (leading from one place to another)

   Synonym: genomgång

2. (a) passage, (a) transit (act of passing over, across, or through)
3. (astronomy) a transit
4. a passage (of text or music)
5. (dressage) passage

• passage in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• passage in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• passage in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)