cement

noun

1. 1

   A powdered substance produced by firing (calcining) calcium carbonate (limestone) and clay that develops strong cohesive properties when mixed with water. The main ingredient of concrete.

   In the autumn there was a row at some cement works about the unskilled labour men. A union had just been started for them and all but a few joined. One of these blacklegs was laid for by a picket and knocked out of time.

   Indigenous bacteria, which naturally exist in specific environments, are being increasingly utilized in self-healing cement to promote calcite precipitation, a process that fills cracks and restores the material’s structural integrity [4,5].

2. 2

   The paste-like substance resulting from mixing such a powder with water, or the rock-like substance that forms when it dries.

3. 3

   Any material with strong adhesive and cohesive properties such as binding agents, glues, grout.

4. 4

   figurativeA bond of union; that which unites firmly, as persons in friendship or in society.

   the cement of our love

5. 5

   The layer of bone investing the root and neck of a tooth; cementum.

verb

1. 1

   To affix with cement.

2. 2

   To overlay or coat with cement.

   to cement a cellar floor

3. 3

   figurativeTo unite firmly or closely.

   For they have entertained cause enough To draw their swords: but how the fear of us May cement their divisions and bind up The petty difference, we yet not know.

   Olympic Games. — Besides the ordinary confederacies that join independent states together, a singular federal bond is remarkable in the Olympic games, which for many ages cemented the Grecian commonwealths by a joint tie of recreation and religious ritual.

4. 4

   figurativeTo repair.

   When neibors anger at a plea, / An' just as wud as wud can be, / How easy can the barley-bree / Cement the quarrel!

5. 5

   figurativeTo make permanent.

   But friendſhip is a calm and ſedate affection, conducted by reaſon and cemented by habit; ſpringing from long acquaintance and mutual obligations; without jealouſies or fears; and without thoſe feveriſh fits of heat and cold, which cauſe ſuch an agreeable torment in the amorous paſſion.

   [Dele] Alli’s ability to break forward from midfield was a prominent feature and the 19-year-old must have gone a long way to cementing his place in the team.

   Me and Mr. Wade, we are good friends. My respect for him has grown over these seven weeks of attacks. We are very good friends. I think but for these attacks, it would have been a friendship that, as life goes, we would have stopped having. I think that you have cemented that we'll be friends to the day we die.

Forms

plural

cements

past tense

cemented

past participle

cemented

present participle

cementing

third person singular

cements