alley
pronunciation
How to pronounce alley in British English:
UK [ˈæli]
How to pronounce alley in American English:
US [ˈæli]
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- Noun:
- a narrow street with walls on both sides
- a lane down which a bowling ball is rolled toward pins
Word Origin
- alley
- alley: [14] Alley is related to French aller ‘go’. Old French aler (which came from Latin ambulāre ‘walk’, source of English amble and ambulance) produced the derived noun alee ‘act of walking’, hence ‘place where one walks, passage’.=> amble, ambulance
- alley (n.)
- mid-14c., "passage in a house; open passage between buildings; walkway in a garden," from Old French alee (13c., Modern French allée) "a path, passage, way, corridor," also "a going," from fem. of ale, past participle of aler "to go," which ultimately may be a contraction of Latin ambulare "to walk," or from Gallo-Roman allari, a back-formation from Latin allatus "having been brought to" [Barnhart]. Compare sense evolution of gate. Applied by c. 1500 to "long narrow enclosure for playing at bowls, skittles, etc." Used in place names from c. 1500. The word is applied in American English to what in London is called a mews, and also is used there especially of a back-lane parallel to a main street (1729). To be up someone's alley "in someone's neighborhood" (literally or figuratively) is from 1931; alley-cat attested by 1890.
Synonym
Example
- 1. A man rests in an alley outside chungking mansions on dec. 2 , 2009 .
- 2. He rounds a corner into an alley where several people loiter outside a club .
- 3. Like most people , I find public speaking more frightening than spiders or the prospect of being mugged in a dark alley .
- 4. Luyuan 's new apartment was across the highway from room 817 , down a dark , pungent alley in the red-light district .
- 5. Speaking in an alley near the shenzhen plant , a 27-year-old engineer expresses his happiness at being sent to a brazilian foxconn factory .