buttons

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbʌtn̩z/

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: but‧tons

Noun

buttons

1. plural of button

Noun

buttons

1. The dung of sheep.
2. (colloquial) A remote control.
3. (colloquial, dated) A boy servant, or page.
   • 1860 December – 1861 August, Charles Dickens, Great Expectations […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, […], published October 1861, →OCLC:

     A Custum' Us officer knows what to do with his Buttons, "said the Jack , repeating the obnoxious word with the greatest contempt , “when they comes betwixt him and his own light […] "

4. (slang) A policeman.
   • 1939, Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, Penguin, published 2011, page 78:

     ‘Go ahead, call the buttons. You'll get a big reaction from it.’

5. (colloquial) Synonym of marbles (“sanity; mental faculties”)
   • 2004, Jane Stevenson, The Empress of the Last Days, page 109:

     And we've got that other boy now, Ganesh something, I met him once, and I didn't understand a word he was saying, but the child seems to have all his buttons.

   • 2006, Frances Hunter, To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark, page 84:

     That night in his room before he'd left for New Orleans, Lewis had behaved like he didn't have all his buttons.

   • 2018, Cherry Wilson, Outcasts of Picture Rocks:

     In the quaint vernacular of old Dad Peppin, Zion Jore might not have all his buttons, but he had more of what he did have than most men—more imagination to conceive a plot, more daring to carry it out, no fear to hamper him, […]

6. A small South African plant of the genus Conophytum, with button-like succulent leaves covering its exterior.

Verb

buttons

1. third-person singular simple present indicative of button

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /by.tɔ̃/

Verb

buttons

1. inflection of butter:
   1. first-person plural present indicative
   2. first-person plural imperative