muscle

1. 1.

   one of the contractile organs of the body

   Synonymsmusculus

   Broadercontractile organ

   Narrowerskeletal musclepronatorsupinatorlevatorantagonistic muscleocular musclerectussmooth musclesphinctertensor

   Partsmuscle cell
2. 2.

   animal tissue consisting predominantly of contractile cells

   Synonymsmuscular tissue

   Broaderanimal tissue

   Narrowerstriated muscle tissuecardiac musclesmooth muscle

   Part ofmuscular structure
3. 3.

   a bully employed as a thug or bodyguard

   “the drug lord had his muscleman to protect him”

   Synonymsmuscleman

   Broaderbully
4. 4.

   authority or power or force (especially when used in a coercive way)

   “the senators used their muscle to get the party leader to resign”

   Broaderauthority
5. 5.

   possessing muscular strength

   Synonymsbrawnbrawninessmuscularitysinewheftiness

   Broaderstrength

1. 1.

   make one's way by force

   “He muscled his way into the office”

   Broaderpass

Other forms of muscle

plural

muscles·

past tense

muscled·

present participle

muscling·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about muscle

What does muscle mean?

muscle means "one of the contractile organs of the body". That is the primary sense; the word has 6 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in muscle?

muscle has 2 syllables: mus-cle. The stress falls on "mus". In IPA it is /ˈmʌsəl/.

What is another word for muscle?

Close synonyms include musculus, muscular tissue, muscleman, brawn, brawniness. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is muscle a common word?

muscle is banded "Common" — everyday vocabulary in speech and writing. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.

What rhymes with muscle?

1 word rhymes with muscle. Rhymes are matched on the phonemes from the last stressed vowel onward, which is the definition a reader has in their head.