Definition of "train"

Elongated or trailing portion.

1. The elongated back portion of a dress or skirt (or an ornamental piece of material added to similar effect), which drags along the ground.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • They called each other by their Christian name, were always arm in arm when they walked, pinned up each other's train for the dance, and were not to be divided in the set [...].

     1803 (date written), [Jane Austen], Northanger Abbey; published in Northanger Abbey: And Persuasion. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: John Murray, […], 20 December 1817 (indicated as 1818)

   • He was generally seen trooping like a colt at his mother's heels, equipped in a pair of his father's cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up with one hand, as a lady does her train in bad weather.

     1819, Washington Irving, The Sketch Book, Rip Van Winkle

   • Lace sleeves, a demure neckline, a full skirt and a relatively modest train.

     2011 April 20, Imogen Fox, The Guardian

2. A trail or line of something, especially gunpowder.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • [E]mancipation is put into such a train that in a few years there will be no slaves Northward of Maryland.

     1785, Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Richard Price‎

   • A party was sent to search, and there they found all the powder ready prepared, and, moreover, a man with a lantern, one Guy Fawkes, who had undertaken to be the one to set fire to the train of gunpowder, hoping to escape before the explosion.

     1873, Charlotte Mary Yonge, Aunt Charlotte's Stories of English History for the little ones

3. The tail of a bird.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • Let frantike Talbot triumph for a while,And like a Peacock ſweepe along his tayle,Wee’le pull his Plumes, and take away his Trayne,If Dolphin and the reſt will be but rul’d.

     1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene iii], page 108, column 2

   • The burning evening sun lighted with mellow gold the coats of the fierce little tiger-kittens — orange silk with stripes of black velvet — the broken amethysts and ruined emeralds of the poor bird's train cruelly scattered over the trampled grass

     1894, Sir Edwin Arnold, Wandering Words, page 260

   • Fawn and pearl of the lyre-bird's train, / Sheen of the bronze-wing, blue of the crane; / Cream of the plover, grey of the dove; / These are the hues of the land I love!

     1917, William Henry Fitchett, Australia in the making, page xii

   • Before the Spanish Conquest, the long, slender, green plumes of the male bird's train adorned the headgear of Aztec and Mayan kings and chieftains, as one may clearly see in modern restorations of ancient scenes.

     1945, Nature Magazine, page 299

4. (obsolete) The tail of an animal in general.

5. (poetic) The elongated body or form of something narrow and winding, such as the course of a river or the body of a snake.  examples

6. (astronomy) A transient trail of glowing ions behind a large meteor as it falls through the atmosphere or accompanying a comet as it nears the sun; tail.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • Finally, all men saw that astronomical knowledge lied not, and they awaited the comet. Its approach was not, at first, seemingly rapid; nor was its appearance of very unusual character. It was of a dull red, and had little perceptible train.

     1839, Edgar Allan Poe, The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion

   • It sometimes happens that the train is directed towards the sun, or makes a certain angle with the line joining the head and the sun; it was then called by the ancient astronomers the beard of the comet.

     1877, Amédée Guillemin, James Glaisher, The World of Comets, page 200

   • ...the comet expands, its vapours are developed and escape in jets towards the radiant star; then we see them driven back on each side of the head and the caudal train commencing.

     2014, Camille Flammarion, Popular Astronomy, page 515

7. (now rare) An animal's trail or track.

8. (obsolete, hunting) Something dragged or laid along the ground to form a trail of scent or food along which to lure an animal.

9. (obsolete) Gait or manner of running of a horse.

Connected sequence of people or things.

1. A group of people following an important figure such as a king or noble; a retinue, a group of retainers.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • Sir, I invite your Highness and your train / To my poor cell, where you shall take your rest /For this one night

     1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act V, scene i]

   • The imperial train arrived on November 22 at Te-chou, a city in western Shantung along the border of Chihli.

     1979, Silas H. L. Wu, Passage to Power: Kʻang-hsi and His Heir Apparent, 1661-1722‎, Harvard University Press, page 78

   • Grace was glad the citizenry did not know Katherine Gordon was in the king’s train, but she was beginning to understand Henry’s motive for including the pretender’s wife.

     2009, Anne Easter Smith, The King's Grace

2. A group of animals, vehicles, or people that follow one another in a line, such as a wagon train; a caravan or procession.  examples

3. (figuratively, poetic) A group or class of people.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • Theſe are the cruel pirates of Argier,That damned train, the ſcum of Affrica, […]

     c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, Act III, scene iii

4. (military) The men and vehicles following an army, which carry artillery and other equipment for battle or siege.

5. A sequence of events or ideas which are interconnected; a course or procedure of something.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • A man may be absorbed in the deepest thought, and his brow will remain smooth until he encounters some obstacle in his train of reasoning, or is interrupted by some disturbance, and then a frown passes like a shadow over his brow.

     1872, Charles Darwin, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals

   • Failure to acknowledge an A.T.C. warning or excessive speed starts the same train of events until correction is made.

     1960 November, P. Ransome=Wallis, “Modern motive power of the German Federal Railway: Part Three”, in Trains Illustrated, page 679

   • "Where was I?" he asked several times during the lunch, losing his train of thought.

     2012 June 18, Rory Carroll, The Guardian

6. A set of things, events, or circumstances that follow after or as a consequence; aftermath, wake.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • Thus the development of reason is accompanied by no inner blight or withering. It does not bring in its train loss of faith or weakening of sympathies.

     1907, Margaret McMillan, Labour and Childhood, page 120

7. (obsolete) State of progress, status, situation (in phrases introduced by in a + adjective); also proper order or situation (introduced by in or in a alone).  quotations

   Quotations

   • As we had been in a good train for several days past, I thought it not prudent to break with him, for little matters.

     1748, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter XXVI”, in Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: […], volume IV, London: […] S[amuel] Richardson; […], page 139

   • I took care that my absence should neither be lamented by the poor nor the rich. I put every thing in a fair train of going on smoothly, and actually set out, with my steward, for my estate in Wales at dawning of the day.

     1779, Samuel Jackson Pratt, chapter 7, in Shenstone-Green: or, the New Paradise Lost‎, volume 1, London: R. Baldwin, page 46

   • When I refer you to the state of the counsels, which prevailed at the period you left this city, and add that they are now if possible in a worse train than ever, you will find but little ground on which the hope of a good establishment can be formed.

     1787, George Washington, letter to Alexander Hamilton dated 10 July, 1787, in The Writings of George Washington, Boston: American Stationers’ Company, 1837, Volume 9, p. 260

   • […] every thing was now in a fairer train for Miss Crawford’s marrying Edmund than it had ever been before.

     1814 July, [Jane Austen], chapter VI, in Mansfield Park: […], volume III, London: […] T[homas] Egerton, […], pages 120-121

8. A set of interconnected mechanical parts which operate each other in sequence.  examples

9. A series of electrical pulses.  examples

10. A series of specified vehicles (originally tramcars in a mine as usual, later especially railway carriages) coupled together.  examples

11. A mechanical (traditionally steam-powered, now typically diesel or electrical) vehicle carrying a large number of passengers and freight along a designated track or path; a line of connected wagons considered overall as a mode of transport; (as uncountable noun) rail or road travel.  quotations  examples

    Quotations

    • We expressed our readiness, and in ten minutes were in the station wagon, rolling rapidly down the long drive, for it was then after nine. […] As we reached the lodge we heard the whistle, and we backed up against one side of the platform as the train pulled up at the other.

      1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd.

    • This winter we thought we'd go to Venice by train, for the adventure.

      2009 January 24, Hanif Kureishi, The Guardian

    • A “moving platform” scheme […] is more technologically ambitious than maglev trains even though it relies on conventional rails. Local trains would use side-by-side rails to roll alongside intercity trains and allow passengers to switch trains by stepping through docking bays.

      2013 June 1, “Ideas coming down the track”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, page 13 (Technology Quarterly)

12. (informal) A service on a railway line.  examples

13. A long, heavy sleigh used in Canada for the transportation of merchandise, wood, etc.  examples

14. (computing) A software release schedule.  quotations  examples

    Quotations

    • What steps do development engineers follow when adding new feature code? How do they support different software versions or release trains?

      2008, Michael Bushong, Cathy Gadecki, Aviva Garrett, JUNOS For Dummies, page 16

15. (sex, slang) An act wherein series of men line up and then penetrate a person, especially as a form of gang rape.  quotations

    Quotations

    • “You want us to run a train on you?”

      2005, Violet Blue, Best Women's Erotica 2006: Volume 2001, link

(intransitive) To practice an ability.  examples

(transitive) To teach and form (someone) by practice; to educate (someone).  quotations  examples

(intransitive) To improve one's fitness.  examples

(intransitive) To proceed in sequence.  examples

(transitive) To move (a gun) laterally so that it points in a different direction.  examples

(transitive, horticulture) To encourage (a plant or branch) to grow in a particular direction or shape, usually by pruning and bending.  quotations  examples

(transitive, machine learning) To feed data into an algorithm, usually based on a neural network, to create a machine learning model that can perform some task.  quotations  examples

(transitive, mining) To trace (a lode or any mineral appearance) to its head.  examples

(transitive, video games) To create a trainer (cheat patch) for; to apply cheats to (a game).  quotations  examples

(transitive, obsolete) To draw (something) along; to trail, to drag (something).  quotations

(intransitive, obsolete, of clothing) To trail down or along the ground.

(uncountable, obsolete) Treachery; deceit.  quotations

(countable, obsolete) A trick or stratagem.

(countable, obsolete) A trap for animals, a snare; (figuratively) a trap in general.

(countable, obsolete) A lure; a decoy.

(countable, obsolete, falconry) A live bird, handicapped or disabled in some way, provided for a young hawk to kill as training or enticement.

(transitive, obsolete) To draw by persuasion, artifice, or the like; to attract by stratagem; to entice; to allure.  quotations

(obsolete, colloquial) To be on intimate terms with.

(obsolete) train oil, whale oil.