Definition of "mast"

mast¹

/mɑːst/

noun
plural masts
1. (nautical, communication, aviation) A tall, slim post or tower, usually tapering upward, used to support, for example, sails or observation platforms on a ship, the main rotor of a helicopter, flags, floodlights, meteorological instruments, or communications equipment, such as an aerial, usually supported by guy-wires (except in the case of a helicopter).
2. (naval) A non-judicial punishment ("NJP"); a disciplinary hearing under which a commanding officer studies and disposes of cases involving those under his command.
verb
third-person singular simple present masts, present participle masting, simple past and past participle masted
1. To supply and fit a mast to (a ship).

mast²

/mɑːst/

noun
countable and uncountable, plural masts
1. The fruit of forest-trees (beech, oak, chestnut, pecan, etc.), especially if having fallen from the tree, used as fodder for pigs and other animals.
  Quotations
  She shut them straight in sties, and gave them meat: / Oak-mast, and beech, and cornel fruit, they eat,
  c. 1609, George Chapman, Homer, Prince of Poets [translation of Odyssey]
  The Winter comes, and then the falling Maſt, / For greedy Swine, provides a full repaſt.
  1697, Virgil, “The Second Book of the Georgics”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], page 93, lines 755–756
  [T]hey feed and grovel like Swine under an Oak, filling themſelves with the Maſt, but never ſo much as looking up, either to the Bows that bore, or the Hands that ſhook it down.
  1715, Robert South, “A Sermon on Proverbs i. 32.”, in Twelve Sermons Preached at Several Times, and upon Several Occasions, volume IV, London: […] G. James, for Jonah Bowyer […], pages 73–74
  He […] would begin to pick up the seed-cases or mast, squeeze each one with his fingers to see if it were fertile, and drop it if it were not.
  1955, Robin Jenkins, The Cone-Gatherers, Canongate, published 2012, page 162
verb
third-person singular simple present masts, present participle masting, simple past and past participle masted
1. (of swine and other animals) To feed on forest seed or fruit.
2. (agriculture, forestry, ecology, of a population of plants) To produce a very large quantity of fruit or seed in certain years but not others.
  Quotations
  Any individual tree which masted in a generally non-mast year would be subjected to the exclusive attention of the seed predators and so would be selected against.
  1985, Michael Fenner, Seed ecology‎, page 33
  However, if this were true, all or most masting species (e.g., Fagus and Quercus) in a forest would have to mast in synchrony to be effective against generalist herbivores.
  2004, Michael Scherer-Lorenzen, Christian Körner, Ernst-Detlef Schulze, Forest Diversity and Function: Temperate and Boreal Systems‎, page 28
  Because dipterocarp seeds are winged and spin gracefully as they fall, the dispersal of millions of dipterocarp seeds during a masting event is one of the greatest spectacles that you can see on planet Earth.
  2008, Chris Rowthorn, Muhammad Cohen, China Williams, Borneo‎, page 50

mast³

/mɑːst/

noun
uncountable
1. (bodybuilding slang) The anabolic steroid Drostanolone propionate, also known as Masteron

mast⁴

/mɑːst/

noun
plural masts
1. (obsolete, billiards) A type of heavy cue, with the broad end of which one strikes the ball.
  Quotations
  Godfrey thus conquered, pretended to lose his temper, curs'd his own ill luck, swore that the table had a cast, and that the balls did not run true, changed his mast, and with great warmth challenged his enemy to double his sum.
  1751, [Tobias] Smollett, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to IV), London: Harrison and Co., […]

Definition of "mast"

mast1

noun

verb

mast2

noun

Quotations

verb

Quotations

mast3

noun

mast4

noun

Quotations

mast¹

mast²

mast³

mast⁴