<p><strong>Noun:</strong></p><ul><li>a small bed for an infant, usually on rockers.</li><li>any of various supports for objects set horizontally, as the support for the handset of a telephone.</li><li>the place where anything is nurtured during its early existence: Boston was the cradle of the American Revolution.</li><li>a frame of wood with a row of long curved teeth projecting above and parallel to a scythe, for laying grain in bunches as it is cut.</li><li>a scythe together with the cradle in which it is set.</li><li>a wire or wicker basket used to hold a wine bottle in a more or less horizontal position while the wine is being served.</li><li>the part of a gun carriage on which a recoiling gun slides.</li><li>a landing platform for ferryboats, rolling on inclined tracks to facilitate loading and unloading at different water levels.</li><li>a docklike structure in which a rigid or semirigid airship is built or is supported during inflation.</li><li>a shaped support for a boat, cast, etc.; chock.</li><li>a moving framework on which a hull slides down the ways when launched.</li><li>a built-up form on which plates of irregular form are shaped.</li><li>a frame that prevents the bedclothes from touching an injured part of a bedridden patient.</li><li>a box on rockers for washing sand or gravel to separate gold or other heavy metal.</li><li>an engraver's tool for laying mezzotint grounds.</li><li>a structure of wooden strips attached to the back of a panel, used as a support and to prevent warping.</li></ul><p><strong>Verb (used with object):</strong></p><ul><li>to hold gently or protectively.</li><li>to place or rock in or as in an infant's cradle.</li><li>to nurture during infancy.</li><li>to receive or hold as a cradle.</li><li>to cut (grain) with a cradle.</li><li>to place (a vessel) on a cradle.</li><li>to wash (sand or gravel) in a cradle; rock.</li><li>to support (a panel) with a cradle.</li></ul><p><strong>Verb (used without object):</strong></p><ul><li>to lie in or as if in a cradle.</li><li>to cut grain with a cradle scythe.</li></ul>