Law. a pleading in which a party responds to his or her opponent's statement of position, especially the defendant's reply to the plaintiff's complaint.
8.
Music. the entrance of a fugue subject, usually on the dominant, either slightly altered or transposed exactly after each presentation in the tonic.
a screen or mat covered with a dark material for shielding a camera lens from excess light or glare.
a fool or simpleton; ninny.
the offspring of a zebra and a donkey.
a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.
a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.
an extraordinary or unusual thing, person, or event; an exceptional example or instance.
answer back, to reply impertinently or rudely: Well-behaved children do not answer back when scolded.
Idiom
24.
answer the helm, Nautical. (of a vessel) to maneuver or remain steady according to the position of the rudder.
Origin: before 900; Middle English andswerien,Old English andswerian, andswarian derivative of andswaru an answer, equivalent to and- opposite, facing (compare and, along) + Germanic *swarō, derivative of swear
Related forms
an·swer·er, noun
an·swer·less, adjective
un·an·swered, adjective
un·an·swer·ing, adjective
well-an·swered, adjective
Synonyms 1. riposte. Answer,rejoinder,reply,response,retort all mean words used to meet a question, remark, charge, etc. An answer is a return remark: an answer giving the desired information. A rejoinder is a quick, usually clever answer or remark made in reply to another's comment, not to a question. Reply usually refers to a direct or point-by-point response to a suggestion, proposal, question, or the like: a reply to a letter. A response often suggests an answer to an appeal, exhortation, etc., or an expected or fixed reply: a response to inquiry; a response in a church service. A retort implies a keen, prompt answer, especially one that turns a remark upon the person who made it: a sharp retort. 6. defense, plea.
O.E. andswaru "a reply," from and- "against" (see ante) + -swaru "affirmation," from swerian "to swear" (see swear), suggesting an original sense of "make a sworn statement rebutting a charge." A common Gmc. compound (cf. O.S. antswor, O.N. andsvar,
O.Fris. ondser), implying a P.Gmc. *andswara-. Meaning "a reply to a question," the main modern sense, was in O.E. The verb is from O.E. answarian. Answerable "liable to be held responsible" is from 1540s. The telephone answering machine is from 1961.