lute

¹ American  

[loot] / lut /

noun

1. a stringed musical instrument having a long, fretted neck and a hollow, typically pear-shaped body with a vaulted back.

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verb (used without object)

luted, luting

1. to play a lute.

verb (used with object)

luted, luting

1. to perform (music) on a lute.

   a musician skilled at luting Elizabethan ballads.

2. to express (a feeling, mood, etc.) by means of a lute.

   The minstrel eloquently luted his melancholy.

lute ² American  

[loot] / lut /

noun

1. luting.

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verb (used with object)

luted, luting

1. to seal or cement with luting.

lute ³ American  

[loot] / lut /

noun

1. a paving tool for spreading and smoothing concrete, consisting of a straightedge mounted transversely on a long handle.

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verb (used with object)

luted, luting

1. to spread and smooth (concrete in a pavement) with a lute.

lute ¹ British  

/ luːt /

noun

1. Also called: luting.  a mixture of cement and clay used to seal the joints between pipes, etc

2. dentistry a thin layer of cement used to fix a crown or inlay in place on a tooth

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verb

1. (tr) to seal (a joint or surface) with lute

lute ² British  

/ luːt /

noun

1. an ancient plucked stringed instrument, consisting of a long fingerboard with frets and gut strings, and a body shaped like a sliced pear

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Etymology

Origin of lute¹

First recorded in 1325–75; Middle English lut(e), luet, luit, from Middle French, Old French leut, lut, from Old Provençal laut, from Arabic al ʿūd oud ( def. )

Origin of lute²

First recorded in 1375–1425; late Middle English, from Old French lut and Medieval Latin lutum, “mud, dirt, clay; clay for modeling”

Origin of lute³

An Americanism dating back to 1870–75; from Dutch loet

Explanation

A lute is an old-fashioned stringed instrument that looks like a small, pear-shaped guitar. The lute appears in many of Shakespeare's plays. You might also see a lute player at a Renaissance Faire. The wooden body of a lute is very round, while the front is flat with strings extending up the long neck to frets, like a ukulele or a guitar. Lute players are called luthiers, and they play mainly by plucking the strings, rather than strumming them. The word lute comes from the Old Provençal laut, from the Arabic root al-'ud, "the wood."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

lute luted luting

Irish pipes, bouzouki, violin and fiddle also feature in the performance alongside an oud - a stringed instrument often described as similar to the European lute - and Middle Eastern percussion.

From BBC ● Jan. 26, 2026

Harpsichord and viola da gamba act as soloists as well as continuo; a modern lute song is a lullaby.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 5, 2025

A Dutch guide to marine life from the late 1500s claims that some whale species “like to hear music played on the lute, harp, flute and similar instruments.”

From Salon ● Aug. 23, 2024

Outside the church, Byrd wrote florid music for the virginal, and pioneered the consort song, a precursor to the lute song.

From New York Times ● Jul. 4, 2023

I moved a finger and the chord went minor in a way that always sounded to me as if the lute were saying sad.

From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss

I wouldn't trade the cramped, pol luted, noisy and ungovernable city for any purified and antiseptic community in the U.S.

From Time Magazine Archive

The charging orifice is then closed, the aludels are luted, and everything made tight.

From Scientific American Supplement, No. 312, December 24, 1881 by Various

The articles are hermetically luted in an iron box, packed with nitrogenous and saline substances such as potash, bone dust, leather cuttings, and salt.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Slice 2 "Anjar" to "Apollo" by Various

Having extended the body on the platform of the air-pump, lowered the receiver and luted the rim, I undertook to submit it gradually to the influence of a dry vacuum and cold.

From The Man With The Broken Ear by Henry Holt

Sheet iron box luted at bottom with water.

From Paint Technology and Tests by Henry A. Gardner

Wine-stained moments on the wing, Moonlit hours go luting by, She who leads the flight of Spring Leads the midnight revelry.

From A Lute of Jade : selections from the classical poets of China by L. (Launcelot) Cranmer-Byng

Argoil: potter's clay, used for luting or closing vessels in the laboratories of the alchemists; Latin, "argilla;" French, "argile."

From The Canterbury Tales, and Other Poems by D. Laing Purves

Instances of nouns and adjectives employed as verbs are: pennanc’d, luting, passion’d, neighbour’d, syllabling, companion’d, labrynth, anguish’d, poesied, vineyard’d, woof’d, loaned, medicin’d, zon’d, mesh, pleasure, legion’d, companion, green’d, gordian’d, character’d, finn’d, forest’d, tusk’d, monitor.

From Leigh Hunt's Relations with Byron, Shelley and Keats by Barnette Miller

Before beginning any experiment, the closeness of the luting ought always to be previously tried, either by slightly heating the retort A, Pl.

From Elements of Chemistry, In a New Systematic Order, Containing all the Modern Discoveries by Antoine Lavoisier

The wind of vision died in my brain; and lo, The jangling of the caravan's long gait Was small as the luting of a breeze in grass Upon my ears.

From Georgian Poetry 1911-12 by Sir Edward Howard Marsh

Related Words

• adhesive
• mud
• plaster
• sand