cable
/ˈkeɪb(ə)l
/noun
1A thick rope of wire or hemp used for construction, mooring ships, and towing vehicles: steel cables held the convoy together...
- And they are tampering with the mooring ropes and cables of many of the craft to gain access to their decks.
- If you do, be sure you will be swarmed by alien looking thick dark cables, strange wires, strange boxes of all sizes and shapes, and a whole range of sharp needles.
- Consider cable or wire rope instead of chain, as it is harder to cut and requires special tools.
Synonyms
rope, cord, line, guy, piece of cordage;
wire, chain;
Nautical hawser, stay, bridle, topping lift;
North American choker
1.1The chain of a ship’s anchor.She still reached her convoy rendezvous in Loch Ewe on time, but while waiting for sailing orders lost her starboard anchor when the cable snapped....
- It was a good team effort with one man only missing out by metres before the second diver found the cable and eventually the anchor.
- Their task was to cut the cables anchoring a boom and antishipping net stretched across the river directly under the machine guns and cannons in a fort overlooking the river.
1.2 Nautical A length of 200 yards (182.9 m) or (in the US) 240 yards (219.4 m): he caught a glimpse of the mast, a cable or two downwind...
- ‘Peningo’ was put under tow attached to a line two cables long.
- Each of the three pieces was clearly three cables long.
- On both sides of these rocks there is a very good wide channel for ships to come in; that on the south side is three cables long and seven fathoms deep, and that on the north side two cables long.
1.3 short for cable stitch.
1.4 (also cable moulding) Architecture A moulding resembling twisted rope.The handsome edifice has such Federal style adornments as stone lintels over the windows and a cornice with mutules and cable molding....
- The cable molding is only a little more expensive than regular floor molding and it provides what seems like a very useful purpose.
- Stones were salvaged from a fireplace found on the land, materials matching originals were used, the cable molding that decorated the ceilings was restored and the formal gardens were reborn.
2An insulated wire or wires having a protective casing and used for transmitting electricity or telecommunication signals: an underground cable [mass noun]: transatlantic phone calls went by cable...
- We still await a decision on the sensitive issue of the on-site over-head high voltage electricity cables.
- Power bosses have agreed to replace underground electricity cables to help improve poor supply following a spate of power cuts in Westhoughton.
- Installation of underground electricity cables is 97 percent complete but a change of plans is causing a delay to the final completion of the project.
Synonyms
wire, lead, cord;
power line;
British flex
2.1A cablegram: this was an occasion for using the telephone, not cables, teletexes, or letters...
- No one with any sense ever supposed that telephone calls or telegrams or cables were private.
- Before leaving he sent a cable to Hawthorne.
- And after three or four days I sent a cable to Athens that I wouldn't be able to speak at the University of Athens.
2.2 short for cable television. I watch polo on cable...
- While some of the other season's soundtracks are like that, the Fourth Season sounds more like music to cook spaghetti to when friends are over to watch your cable.
- I've got an idea - let's cancel our cable, stop watching TV and go outside.
- We jumped onto the couch, flicking through the cable to watch cartoons.
verb [with object]
1Send a message to (someone) by cablegram: he cabled her to cancel all arrangements...
- Patrick had slipped next door and got their groom to cable him with an urgent message to pick Master Adam up at the station as he was returning earlier than planned.
- When her father cabled her with a whole dollar to support this adventure, she returned to America to study psychology at Berkeley.
- But before the war was quite over Shell cabled me, ‘Can you possibly get released?’
1.1Transmit (a message) by cablegram: the secretariat cabled a reply...
- I wish to cable an urgent telegram to the President.
- On October 22nd, the commissar for the western front cabled a message to him that said: ‘There is nothing left but to give up.’
- However, he cabled a message to the Vice-Admiral inquiring his views of the possibility of rushing the Dardanelles.
1.2 [no object] Send a cablegram: have you got the drugs I cabled for?...
- He cabled to him that he was ‘very sorry to learn that I appear to have got the Government in trouble’.
- His Australian government had cabled to back Britain on August 3.
- Some of the chaps cabled for money on the 11th of this month & haven't heard anything about it yet.
2Provide (an area) with power lines or with the equipment necessary for cable television: nearly all urban areas are cabled, so viewers can choose from up to 20 channels...
- The service is only available in cabled areas in Kilkenny, Clonmel, and Thurles.
- As an added benefit, he explained, the university is using wireless broadband technology to provide Internet access to areas that are not cabled for Ethernet.
- Here in Washington (near Sunderland) most of the town was cabled when it was being built in the 70-80's.
3 Architecture Decorate (a structure) with rope-shaped mouldings.
Origin
Middle English: from an Anglo-Norman French variant of Old French chable, from late Latin capulum 'halter'.