PATE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does pate mean? 

• PATE (noun)
  The noun PATE has 2 senses:

1. liver or meat or fowl finely minced or ground and variously seasoned

2. the top of the head

  Familiarity information: PATE used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• PATE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Liver or meat or fowl finely minced or ground and variously seasoned

Classified under:

Nouns denoting foods and drinks

Hypernyms ("pate" is a kind of...):

paste; spread (a tasty mixture to be spread on bread or crackers or used in preparing other dishes)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "pate"):

duck pate (a pate made from duck liver)

foie gras; pate de foie gras (a pate made from goose liver (marinated in Cognac) and truffles)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The top of the head

Classified under:

Nouns denoting body parts

Synonyms:

crown; pate; poll

Hypernyms ("pate" is a kind of...):

top; top side; upper side; upside (the highest or uppermost side of anything)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "pate"):

tonsure (the shaved crown of a monk's or priest's head)

Holonyms ("pate" is a part of...):

human head (the head of a human being)

 Context examples 

Because your tongue may save your pate.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Laurie was in a flutter of excitement at the idea of having company, and flew about to get ready, for as Mrs. March said, he was 'a little gentleman', and did honor to the coming guest by brushing his curly pate, putting on a fresh color, and trying to tidy up the room, which in spite of half a dozen servants, was anything but neat.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

“Enough, rattle-pate, enough!” said the other.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He pulled off his velvet cap of maintenance as he spoke, and displayed a pate which was as bald as an egg, and shone bravely in the firelight.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“You may find the scath yourself, my lusty friend, if you raise your great cudgel to me. I had as lief have the castle drawbridge drop upon my pate.”

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

To his three squires riding behind him it looked as though he bore the bird's egg as well as its feather, for the back of his bald pate shone like a globe of ivory.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

His heart is as good as thine or mine but he hath more in his pate than ever you will carry under that tin pot of thine, and as a consequence he can see farther into things, so that they weigh upon him more.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In Touraine I got nothing save a broken pate, but at Vierzon I had a great good fortune, for I had a golden pyx from the minster, for which I afterwards got nine Genoan janes from the goldsmith in the Rue Mont Olive.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

This last argument, however, by no means commended itself to the pupil of Ockham, who plucked a great stick from the ground and signified his dissent by smiting the realist over the pate with it.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)