cipher

A numeric character.

Noun

  1. A numeric character.

    Synonyms: number numeral digit

  2. Any text character.
    • In ſucceeding times this vnderſtanding wiſedome began to be written in Ciphers, and Characters, and letters bearing the forme of beaſtes, birds, and other creatures; […] - 1614, Walter Ralegh [i.e., Walter Raleigh], “Of...
  3. A combination or interweaving of letters, as the initials of a name.
    • a painter's cipher
    • an engraver's cipher
    • Just then, an attendant to whom the Queen had whispered returned; and taking a small case from her hand, Anne produced a bracelet somewhat similar to the very one with which Francesca had parted, excepting that it had...

    Synonyms: device monogram

  4. A method of transforming a text in order to conceal its meaning.
    • The message was written in a simple cipher. Anyone could figure it out.
    • He was very early engaged in great ſecrets: For his fatherr, apprehending of what fatal conſequence it would have been to the King’s affairs if his correſpondence had been diſcovered by unfaithful Secretaries, engaged...

    Synonyms: code

  5. A cryptographic system using an algorithm that converts letters or sequences of bits into ciphertext.
    • a public-key cipher
  6. Ciphertext; a message concealed via a cipher.
    • The message is clearly a cipher, but I can't figure it out.
  7. A grouping of three digits in a number, especially when delimited by commas or periods:
    • The probability is 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000 — a number having five ciphers of zeros.
  8. A fault in an organ valve which causes a pipe to sound continuously without the key having been pressed.
  9. A hip-hop jam session.
    • They say no girls in the cipher, so I rock solo - 2011, “The World Is Listening”, in The Journey Aflame, performed by Akua Naru:
  10. The path (usually circular) shared cannabis takes through a group, an occasion of cannabis smoking.
    • As the night seemed darker, cops is on a hunt / They interrupt your cipher, and crush your blunt - 1993, “Midnight”, in Midnight Marauders, performed by A Tribe Called Quest:

    Synonyms: rotation

  11. Someone or something of no importance.
    • There he was a mere cypher: here he was lord of the ascendant; the choice spirit, the dominant genius. - 1824, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “The Club of Queer Fellows”, in Tales of a Traveller, part 2...

    Synonyms: nobody nonentity nothing absolute zero also-ran chopped liver cipher crumb Joe Nobody little guy minnow nebbish no one nothingburger picayune pip-squeak pleb peon prole puny quidam rinky-dink shrimp wankstain

  12. Zero.
    • O pardon: ſince a crooked Figure may / Atteſt in little place a Million, / And let vs, Cyphers to this great Accompt, / On your imaginarie Forces worke. - 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the...
    • Firſt, Find what Decimal of a Pound .625 will Repreſent, which is eaſily done if you prepone a Cypher, and half the Number is the Decimal of a Pound. The Number with a Cypher preponed is .0625, ½ is .03125. - 1716, John...
    • We saw earlier about this new symbol, the cipher, that can make numbers big. - 2024, Numberphile, by Brady Haran with Rob Eastaway, The Big X - Numberphile:

Origin

14th century. From Middle English cifre, from Old French cyfre, cyffre (French chiffre), ultimately from Arabic صِفْر (ṣifr, “zero, empty”), from صَفَرَ (ṣafara, “to be empty”). Doublet of chiffre and zero. Sense 8 (a fault in an organ valve) may be a different word.

Forms

ciphers cypher

Derived

Baconian cipher Bacon's cipher Beaufort cipher bifid cipher block cipher Caesar cipher cipherdom cipherhood cipherlike ciphertext ciphony classical cipher cypherpunk decipher encipher Feistel cipher Gronsfeld cipher Julius Caesar cipher Nihilist cipher pigpen cipher Playfair cipher rail fence cipher stream cipher subcipher

Verb

  1. To calculate.
    • I never learned much more than how to read and cipher.
    • For the mischief that one blockhead, that every blockhead does, in a world so feracious, teeming with endless results as ours, no ciphering will sum up. - 1843 April, Thomas Carlyle, “Abbot Samson”, in Past and Present,...
    • So I must baffle at the hint / And cipher at the sign, / And make much blunder, if at last / I take the clew divine. - a. 1887 (date written), Emily Dickinson, “[Book IV.—Time and Eternity] (please specify the chapter...
  2. To write in code or cipher.
  3. Of an organ pipe: to sound independent of the organ.
  4. To decipher.
    • Yea the illiterate that know not how To cipher what is writ in learned bookes, VVill cote my lothſome treſpaſſe in my lookes. - 1594, William Shakespeare, Lucrece (First Quarto), London: […] Richard Field, for Iohn...

Forms

ciphers ciphering ciphered cypher

Derived

cipherable cipherer recipher