context

From Latin context(us).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒn.tɛkst/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑn.tɛkst/
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /ˈkɔn.tekst/

context (countable and uncountable, plural contexts)

2. The surroundings, circumstances, environment, background or settings that determine, specify, or clarify the meaning of an event or other occurrence.

   Synonyms: frame, framework, background, backdrop, setting, purlieus, milieu

   —In what context did your attack on him happen? —We had a pretty tense relationship at the time, and when he insulted me I snapped.

   • 2012 September 7, Phil McNulty, “Moldova 0-5 England”, in BBC Sport‎^[1]:

     The display and result must be placed in the context that was it was against a side that looked every bit their Fifa world ranking of 141 - but England completed the job with efficiency to record their biggest away win in 19 years.

4. (linguistics) The text in which a word or passage appears and which helps ascertain its meaning.

   Coordinate terms: subtext, paratext, peritext, epitext

   Without any context, I can't tell you if the "dish" refers to the food, or the thing you eat it on.

6. (archaeology) The surroundings and environment in which an artifact is found and which may provide important clues about the artifact's function and/or cultural meaning.
8. (mycology) The trama or flesh of a mushroom.
10. (logic) For a formula: a finite set of variables, which set contains all the free variables in the given formula.
12. (programming) The data (register contents, program counter value, etc.) needed to switch to another thread of execution.

• For quotations using this term, see Citations:context.

• isolation

• subcontext

• (surroundings in situ, in archaeology): provenance, provenience; unprovenanced, unprovenienced

context (third-person singular simple present contexts, present participle contexting, simple past and past participle contexted)

1. (obsolete) To knit or bind together; to unite closely.
   • 1638, Richard Younge, The Drunkard's Character: Or, a True Drunkard with Such Sinnes as Raigne in Him:

     The whole worlds frame, which is contexted onely by commerce and contracts.

   • 1623, Owen Feltham, Resolves: Divine, Moral, Political:

     If the Subiect bee Historie, or contexted Fable, then I hold it better put in Prose, or Blanks: for ordinarie discourse neuer shewes so well in Meeter

context (comparative more context, superlative most context)

1. (obsolete) Knit or woven together; close; firm.
   • 1541?, Robert Copland (translator?), Guydon's Questionary Chirurgical, translation of 1533, Guy de Chauliac, La questionaire des cirugiens at barbiers

     The skynne is composed & context and woven with thredes and vaynes.

   • 1662, Robert Boyle, New Experiments Physico-mechanical, Touching the Spring of the Air, and its Effects, page 73:

     And though he could describe how such a string may be context, yet our Explication will have this advantage in point of probability above his, ...

   • 1711-12, William Derham, Physico-theology: Or, A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, from His Works of Creation (3rd edition, corrected, 1714, page 110)

     the coats, without, are context and callous, firm and strong.

• “context”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “context”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

Borrowed from Latin contextus.

• IPA^(key): (Central) [kunˈtekst]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic) [konˈtekst]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [konˈtɛkst]

context m (plural contexts or contextos)

1. context

• contextual

• “context” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
• “context”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025
• “context”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007

Borrowed from Middle French contexte or Latin contextus.

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɔn.tɛkst/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: con‧text

context m (plural contexten)

1. context

• contextgevoelig
• contextueel

• Afrikaans: konteks
• → Indonesian: konteks

Borrowed from French contexte.

context n (plural contexte)

1. context