Meaning versus Definition

I think about that sometimes, but there is something strange about how "bank" and "bank" are the same word with different meanings, yet "bank" and "bank" are also different words altogether.

But in one case, both "bank"s are a nouns. In the other, "to bank" is a verb. The cut may be grammatical as contrasted with semantic. But I am just guessing. I don't know the way dictionaries make that cut. And, maybe different dictionaries make the cut differently. Something to research.

At your service:

[CENTER]ETYMOLOGY[/CENTER]
bank, noun1

[Middle English banke, probably after the Old Norse *banke, *banki = Old Icelandic bakki ridge, eminence, bank of clouds, of a river, chasm, etc. (whence Danish bakke, Swedish backe, hillock, hill, rising ground, ascent, acclivity): Old Teutonic *bankon-; cognate with Old Teutonic *banki-z, see bank2 and bench; the primary sense of bank- being probably 'shelf,' natural or artificial, of earth, rock, sand, or wood. The Old English representative of banki, bakki, would be *banca, *bnca: a compound (h)banca in sense of 'heel-bench, couch' actually occurs once in a vocabulary, but this may be, as the sense suggests, one of the class of weak compounds from strong ns. (cf. from ); in any case the senses of Middle English banke, as well as its first appearance in the northern dialect, point to its Scandinavian source.]

I. A raised shelf or ridge of ground, etc.

1. A portion of the surface of the ground raised or thrown up into a ridge or shelf; a lengthened mound with steeply sloping sides. Hence, One side or slope of such a ridge or mound. Now chiefly in hedge-bank.
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bank, noun2

[Middle English baunk, banck, apparently a. Old French banc 'bench' (= Portuguese banc, Italian, Spanish banco): late Latin bancus bench, 'scamnum,' ad. Teutonic bank, banc (Medieval High German, Medieval Dutch banc, Old High German banch, German, Dutch bank): Old Teutonic *banki-z bench; cognate with bank, noun1: Old Teutonic *bankon-. If however Old English (h)banca 'heel-bench, couch, sofa,' was really a compound of an Old English *banca (see prec.), the Middle English word might be the lineal descendant of that, subsequently identified with the French banc. The true native equivalent is bench : Old English bnc.]

1. A long seat for several to sit on, a bench, or form; a platform or stage to speak from. Obsolete. (Cf. mountebank.)

2. A seat of justice; = bench. Bank Royal: King's Bench. Common Bank: Common Pleas. (Cf. also banco,noun) archaic or Obsolete.

3. The bench occupied by the rowers of each oar in a galley. (So in French, Italian, German)

4. A rank or tier of oars; used chiefly in reference to the ancient galleys, which had several tiers one above another.

5. a. A row of keys on an organ.

5. b. A row of keys on a typewriter.

6. A shelf. (Cf. German , etc.) Obsolete, rare.

7. a. A bench or table used in various trades; especially in Printing, the table on which the sheets are laid before or after printing. (Cf. Italian banco.)

7. b. optical bank: an optical bench; a graduated bench, usually of steel, on which the holders of lenses, prisms, etc., may be set up in alignment.

8. a. The floor of a glass-melting furnace

8. b. A pottery. Cf. pot-bank (pot,noun1 14).

9. A creel for holding rows of bobbins of cotton.

10. A set of similar pieces of apparatus or units of equipment grouped together. In various spec. uses:

10. a. Electricity. Lights arranged in rows or tiers.

10. b. In Automatic Telephony: a series of fixed contacts in a selector or switch.
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bank, noun3

[Early modern English banke, after French banque, from Italian banca feminine, used side by side, and in same sense, with banco masculine; from Teutonic bank, banc, bench: see preceding word. The double form and gender in Romanic, cf. Italian, Spanish, Portuguese banco, banca, French banc, banche, are apparently original (see medieval Latin bancus, banca, in Du Cange), and due to the double gender of the German: Old High German der, diu banch, Middle High German der, die banc, early modern and dialect German der, die bank. The original meaning 'shelf, bench' (see bank, noun1and noun2, and bench) was extended in Italian to that of 'tradesman's stall, counter, money-changer's table, mensa argentaria, ,' whence 'money-shop, bank,' a use of the word which passed, with the trade of banking, from Italy into other countries. In this sense, It. uses both banco and banca, Spanish and Portuguese the masculine banco; but in France the Italian feminine banca was adapted as banque, whence English banke, bank. The word is thus ultimately identical with bench and bank2 , and cognate with bank1.
(Although, in Italian, monte 'mount, heap, amount, stock,' was used in some of the senses of 'bank,' the notion that the name banco, banca, originated in a German rendering of monte is erroneous: German bank had no such sense as 'mount, heap,' only that of 'bench, shelf.' Rather is it the fact, that in the development of banking, the banco of the money-changer, and the monte or 'joint-stock capital' were at length combined, and bank applied in English to both.)]

I. A money-dealer's table, counter, or shop.

1. The table or counter of a money-changer or dealer in money. Obsolete, except Historical.

2. The shop, office, or place of business of a money-dealer. (Cf. banker2 1a, b.) Now merged in 7a.

II. An amount or stock of money.

3. a. A sum of money, an amount (Italian monte); a 'pile.' (Cf. 'mounts of coin' in last quot.) Obsolete

3. b. especially A sum to draw upon. Obsolete

3. c. A batch of paper-money. Obsolete (except Historical)

4. In games of hazard, the amount or pile of money which the player who plays against all the others, e.g. the proprietor of the gaming-table, has before him.

5. An amount made up by the contributions of many; a joint stock or capital. Obsolete

6. An amount so contributed for lending to the poor; a loan-bank; whence the modern pawn-broker's establishment (French ). Obsolete

III. (Ordinary modern sense.)

7. An establishment for the custody of money received from, or on behalf of, its customers. Its essential duty is the payment of the orders given on it by the customers; its profits arise mainly from the investment of the money left unused by them.

7. a. Banks (in England) may be divided into:

a. Private Banks, carried on by one or more (in Great Britain not exceeding ten) persons in partnership. Cf. sense 2 above.
b. Joint-Stock Banks, of which the capital is subscribed by a large number of shareholders. (Cf. sense 5 above). Of these the greatest is..
c. The Bank of England7. b. bank of deposit, a bank that receives lodgements of money. bank of issue or circulation, a bank which issues its own notes or promises to pay; in Great Britain a bank to which the right of issue was continued by the Acts of 1844-45. branch bank, a branch-office of a bank, established to give banking facilities to a locality at a distance from the head-office. savings-bank, a bank of which the express object is to take charge of the savings of the poorer classes, or of small sums of money.

7. c. figurative

7. d. in bank: in a bank or the bank, at one's bankers'. Also figurative: in store.

7. e. Phrase in the Bank (see quot. 1930).

7. f. transfered A store of things for future use, a reserve supply: specifically of blood for transfusion, tissue for grafting, or the like. Cf. blood-bank (s.v. blood noun 21), eye bank (s.v. eye, noun1 28). originally U.S.

7. g. Catch-phrase to laugh, etc., (originally to cry) all the way to the bank: to relish (orig. ironically, to deplore) the fact that one is making money, esp. undeservedly or at the expense of others.

8. Combined forms:

8. a. attrib. or obj. genitive, as bank-account, -accountant, -building, -charter, -clerk, -coffer, -counter, -deposit, -depositor, -director, -manager, -master (obsolete), -monger, -president, -robber, -robbery, -snatcher.

8. b. Special combinations: bank annuities, a technical term for certain British government funds; usually, the Consolidated 3 per cent. Annuities, or 'consols'; bank balance, the net amount held by a depositor in a bank account; bank card, bankcard, a cheque card or credit card issued by a bank (cf. banker's card s.v. banker2 1c); also, a cashpoint card; bank charge, a fee debited by a bank to a customer's current account for each transaction it carries out on the customer's behalf, and for certain other services; usu. in pl.; bank-cheque, a cheque or order to pay issued upon a bank; bank-circulation, a name applied to receipts given by the Bank of England to contributors to the loan made to the Government in 1751, which circulated as paper currency; bank-clerk, a clerk (see clerk, noun 6b) in a bank; hence bank-clerkly adj.; bank-court, the weekly meeting of the Governor and Directors of the Bank of England, or other joint-stock bank; also, the general court of proprietors; bank-credit, a credit opened for any person by a correspondent of a bank, to enable the former to draw for the amount; bank-money (cf. banco adjective); also, money in the bank; bank-paper, (a) bank-notes in circulation; bills of exchange accepted by a banker; (b) (see quot. 1888); bank-parlour, the court-room of the Bank of England; the room in which a banker or bank-manager does business with borrowers; bank-post, a kind of writing-paper used for foreign correspondence; bank-rate, (a) the rate per cent. per annum fixed from time to time by the Bank of England, at which the company is prepared to discount bills of exchange having not more than 95 days to run; replaced in October 1972 by minimum lending rate (see minimum adjective b); (b) loosely, any rate of interest charged by a bank; bank-receipt, formerly, a receipt given by the Bank of England on its formation, for money deposited to be drawn against; now, an acknowledgement given by a banker for money deposited on a current account; bank-roll U.S., a roll of bank-notes; hence as v. trans. colloq., to support financially; bank statement, a record supplied periodically or on request by a bank to an account-holder, showing all credits and debits over a given period, and the current balance of the account; bank-stockbank-token, a token issued by a bank to serve for payments, on its responsibility, during a scarcity of silver coin; bankward a. and adv., towards the bank. See also bank-bill, -book, -holiday, -note.

DRAFT ADDITIONS DECEMBER 2007:

bank, noun3

bank loan noun [PAY UP OR WERE GOING TO COME AFTER YOU!!! ]
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bank, verb1

[from bank, noun1]

I.

1. transitive To form a bank to; to border, edge, hem in as a bank.

2. intransitive To border upon. Obsolete

3. transitive To confine within a bank. Also figurative

4. Watchmaking:

4. a. transitive To confine the movements of the escapement, which is the function of the two banking-pins in a watch.

4. b. intransitive To impinge against the banking-pins; said of the escapement (or of the watch).

II.

5. To coast, to skirt. Obsolete

6. To bring ashore, to land.

7. To shelter under a bank.

III.

8. a. transitive To heap or pile up. Also figurative

8. b. specifically To pile up (logs) at a landing, etc., for transport by water or rail. U.S. and Canada.

9. intransitive (for reflexive) To rise up into banks. Also, to pile up, accumulate. Also absolute

10. To make up a fire, by covering it with a heap of fuel so pressed down that it will remain a long time burning slowly. Also to bank down

11. to bank out: to empty out (coal as drawn from the pit) into a heap.

12. transitive

12. a. To ascend (an inclined surface).

12. b. To cause to travel an ascending track (attrib. in banking engine = bank-engine, bank noun1 13).

13. transitive In Aeronautics, to tilt (an aeroplane) sideways in turning. Also intransitive, to incline sideways in turning. Also with up.
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bank, verb2

[from bank, noun3]

1. intransitive To keep a bank, act as a banker. (Chiefly in adjective and noun, as in banking-house, etc.)

2. intransitive To deposit money or keep an account with a banker.

3. transitive To deposit in a bank. Also, to convert into current money, 'realize.'

4. a. intransitive To form a 'bank' at a gaming-table; to play against all comers.

4. b. To 'put one's money' upon; to count or rely on with confidence or assurance.

5. transitive To store (blood, tissue, or the like) for future use. originally U.S. Cf. bank, noun3 7f.

[Source: Oxford English Dictionary Online.]
　
If I had any sense, I'd bank verb2 it!

While all this is okay, we need to address the issue raised by the OP.

If i am correct, it is on whether lexical meaning and definition of a word like 'cat' is same?

I have a special interests in 'cats' and hence this would help me in my thoughts. A wild cat like the leopard often prowls within 2 kms of where i stay. Hence it is extremely important for me to know its definition. I would look at this problem in the following manner:

The word 'cat' does mean something. If it does not mean anything, it would not be a word. For example..... a word like 'grunt' in written form suggets a phonetic adaptation of a real sound made by animals. Grunt by itself is no object like a 'cat'.

So grunt can mean something like a particular sound, of a particular frequency, decibel or style, relatively speaking. But to define it within some measure of volume would be a difficult task. In this case, i think that the word grunt can mean, and therfore define to be almost same. Almost because, a scientist may use some kind of a definition define what he would prefer as a 'grunt'.

But for an object like a 'cat'. It is simple. The word 'cat' means (noun1): a small, domestic, fur-covered animal often kpet as a pet, or to catch a mice, etc;
(noun2); wild cats; any animal of the group that includes tigers, lions, panthers and leopards.
(from Oxford advanced learners d'y)

The lexical meaning is conveyed to the reader by the dictionary. The meaning ( a set of words implying or denoting certain aspects of the subject-object concerned, distinguishing the concerned object from other objects or things) in a way is a genral description of WHAT the word may indicate to or imply.

Sometimes, the meaning also gives the definition. The definition is partly indicated by 'animals in a group' in the meaning of the dictionary so used. However it (the meaning) does not fulfill the task of a completely useful, better, thorough and a scientific explanation of that is useful at all times. Because, from the scientific angle the meaning of cat is too general to be called a taxonomic definition.

If I say, ' i saw a wild cat (noun2) outside my window'........ the information given does not give me any idea of what kind of cat, i saw except for the fact that it is not the domesticated one (noun1).

The police or the forest official would like a good description of which type of wild cat i saw outside to determine a kind of action to be taken. Domesticated cats and wild cats although following under a general descriptive word like felines, can be seperated as different categories, defined by its dimension, habits, and afinity to mankind.

I can go on like this, to refine and define the particular kind of cat i saw, by explaning the family it falls into and ultimately the species and subspecies. In short, the exact definition is a matter of detail, descriptive and explanatory to arrive at the exact kind of 'cat' i saw. But the meaning in the initial stage did assert the type of animal i saw. Because a cat is not a dog, neither a monkey, although all have tails and four legs.

If this helped, than i should say, that we have to treat words in its conceptual terminology. As was pointed in an earlier post the word denotes a sign or a symbol. The word (with its spelling) represents a concept. The concept term in this case was 'cat'. A concept called 'cat' implies a kind or category of animals. Just like the word 'tree'. It is not explicit in the exact kind of animal.
For example: all leopards are cats, but all cats are not leopards.

So 'meaning' is a general, functional, normative and sufficient description of a subject-object concerned, while 'definition' is structural, practical, actual and necessary description of the subject-object concerned.

Meaning vs Definition...? Any confusion or conflation between the two is a clear illustration of one who is unable or unwilling to seperate the medium from its message.

Meaning is always an immaterial thought from a mind... always.

Definition is always the material language codification used to relate that thoughtful meaning to another... always.

Longknowledge, your knowledge really is long.