cage

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cage¹

  • /keɪd͡ʒ/

Rhymes with -eɪdʒ

Where it comes from

From Middle English cage, from Old French cage, from Latin cavea. Doublet of cadge and cavea and related to jail.

noun cages · kage

  1. An enclosure made of spaced bars, normally to hold animals while providing some ventilation. We keep a bird in a cage.
  2. The passenger compartment of a lift.
  3. The goal.
  4. abbreviation Short for roll cage, a protective structure around the passenger compartment of a vehicle.
  5. US, broadly, slang Synonym of automobile.

    Similar: automobile

  6. figuratively Something that hinders freedom. Schwartz examines with dignity and tenderness the battles within and without of […] families, created and biological, and the cages and freedom they can provide.
  7. slang A prison or prison cell. The 'out of the closet' lesbians and gay men here in the Iowa Cages are harassed and discriminated daily by oppressive pigs, believe me, I know, as a lesbian I've experienced it first hand and seen my fellow lesbian and gay friends oppressed to where I'm ready to explode.
  8. The area from which competitors throw a discus or hammer.
  9. An outer framework of timber, enclosing something within it. Cage, in carpentry, is an outer work of timber inclosing another within it. Thus the cage of a stair is the wooden inclosure that encircles it.
  10. A skeleton frame to limit the motion of a loose piece, such as a ball valve.
  11. A wirework strainer, used in connection with pumps and pipes.
  12. The drum on which the rope is wound in a hoisting whim.
  13. The protective wire mask at the front of a helmet.
  14. A regular graph that has as few vertices as possible for its girth.
  15. In killer sudoku puzzles, a group of connecting cells that must contain a set of unique digits adding up to a certain total, in addition to the usual constraints of sudoku.

verb cages · caging · caged · kage

  1. transitive To confine in a cage; to put into and keep in a cage. And the row of human captors, ever leering, They who caged me, Know their power and gloat on my captivity.
  2. slang, transitive To imprison. The serial killer was caged for life.
  3. figuratively, transitive To restrict someone's movement or creativity.
  4. To immobilize an artificial horizon. To prevent damage to its gimbal mountings during extreme aerobatic maneuvers, the navball should be caged before the start of a display sequence.
  5. To track individual responses to direct mail, either (advertising) to maintain and develop mailing lists or (politics) to identify people who are not eligible to vote because they do not reside at the registered addresses.

Cage²

proper noun

  1. A surname from French.

Thesaurus

Closest in meaning: coop, batting cage, cage in, encase, bin, box, crate, enclosure, basket, shaft, corral, hole, tank, shoe, gearbox, kennel

Translations

Every language

noun enclosure

Españoljaula, gayola
한국어우리 uri
日本語檻 ori, 篭 kago, ケージ kēji
中文籠子 /笼子 lóngzi, 籠 /笼 lóng
हिन्दीक़फ़स qafas, कफस kaphas, पिंजड़ा piñjṛā, पिंजरा piñjrā
Portuguêsgaiola, jaula
Françaiscage
DeutschKäfig
Italianogabbia
Ελληνικάκλουβί klouví
Românăcușcă
Русскийкле́тка klétka
Tiếng Việtlồng, cái lồng, chuồng, cái chuồng
العربيةقَفَص qafaṣ
עבריתכְּלוּב kluv

noun lift compartment

Españolcabina
Françaiscage
Italianocabina
Русскийкаби́на kabína

verb to put into a cage

Españolenjaular
Portuguêsengaiolar
Françaisencager
Italianoingabbiare

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Cite this
MLA

"cage." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/cage. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

cage. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/cage

Chicago

"cage." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/cage.

BibTeX
@misc{cage_2026,
  title = {cage},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/cage},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}