Word Confusion: Trump versus Trumpet

Plural for the noun: trumps
Gerund: trumping

Third person present verb: trumps
Past tense or past participle: trumped
Present participle: trumping

Plural for the noun: trumpets
Gerund: trumpeting

Third person present verb: trumpets
Past tense or past participle: trumpeted
Present participle: trumpeting

• [trumps] The suit having the rank above the others in a particular hand
• [In a tarot pack] Any of a special suit of 22 cards depicting symbolic and typical figures and scenes
• [Also trump card] A valuable resource that may be used, especially as a surprise, in order to gain an advantage

[Informal; dated] A helpful or admirable person

• To outdo or surpass

[Archaic; instruments] A trumpet or the sound produced by one ²

[Ecclesiastical] The last trump, the final trumpet call that, according to the belief of some, will awaken and raise the dead on the Day of Judgment

Verb, intransitive:
[In bridge, whist, and similar card games] To play the high ranking card on (a card of another suit), having no cards of the suit led ¹

[Music, other] To produce a sound upon or as if upon the trumpet ²

[Slang; British] To expel intestinal gas through the anus

Verb, transitive:
[In bridge, whist, and similar card games] To play a high ranking card on (a card of another suit), having no cards of the suit led ¹

To beat (someone or something) by saying or doing something better

• To get the better of (an adversary or competitor, for example) by using a crucial, often hidden resource

[Music, other] To proclaim or announce with or as if with a fanfare ²

• An organ reed stop with a quality resembling that of a trumpet
• A sound resembling that of a trumpet, especially the loud cry of an elephant
• Something shaped like a trumpet, especially the tubular corona of a daffodil flower

[trumpets] A North American pitcher plant, Genus Sarracenia, family Sarraceniaceae

Verb, intransitive:
To play a trumpet ²

• To make a loud, penetrating sound resembling that of a trumpet

Verb, transitive:
To proclaim widely or loudly ²

Dang it, he played the ace of trumps.

“Forty minutes later she was inside the physics building once more, arguing with the porter, but this time she had a trump card” (Pullman).

Margaret Starbird’s The Tarot Trumps and The Holy Grail “reveals the strong link between the trump cards of the tarot deck and the medieval heresy of the Holy Grail”.

In this month General Haig decided to play his trump card: the tank.

Spencer’s doctor is a trump — I am like a new man.

Unsurprisingly, Donald Trump is the anti-trump, busy trumpeting his innocence.

Would these pitiful dead not rise at the first blast of the trump?

Verb, intransitive:
If he trumped with the 6 or 10, the opponents could overruff.

He insists that charges against him have been trumped up.

The shofar trumped for the people to gather.

To put it politely, he trumped in court.

Verb, transitive:
Why on earth did you trump my ace?

The declarer trumped the last losing spade in dummy.

Taste trumps most if not all other factors when consumers choose food products.

They’ve trumped up charges against her.

Mother had been absent throughout, but Aunt Edie had come up trumps.

He trumped the news everywhere.

An eight-foot trumpet on the organ has a unique sound mechanism.

His voice blazed to a trumpet in his indignation.

Trumpet daffodils can grow to be 16–20 inches tall with wide, narrow, or flared trumpets.

Sarracenia alata, a.k.a. yellow trumpets, bloomed across the fields.

Verb, intransitive:
A jazz band trumpeted on the stage behind, and the kids danced until dark.

We heard wild elephants trumpeting in the bush.

“His elephants, who had been double chained that night, began to trumpet” (Kipling).

He is trumpeted as the dance talent of his generation.

Verb, transitive:
The next day, the press trumpeted the birth of a new star.

They trumpeted the news from the palace balcony.

They trumpeted the signal to begin the attack.

1. Early 16th century, as an alteration of triumph, once used in card games in the same sense.
2. Middle English from the Old French trompe from the Old High German trumpa meaning trumpet.

1. Middle English from the Old French trompette, diminutive of trompe (see trump 2.
2. The verb dates from the mid-16th century.