device

noun

1. Any piece of equipment made for a particular purpose, especially a mechanical or electrical one.

   “Near-synonyms: equipment, tool, machine”

   “1949. Geneva Convention on Road Traffic Chapter VI. Provisions Applicable to Cycles in International Traffic Every cycle shall be equipped with: … (b) an audible warning device consisting of a bell …”

   “An artificial kidney these days still means a refrigerator-sized dialysis machine. Such devices mimic the way real kidneys cleanse blood and eject impurities and surplus water as urine.”

2. A peripheral device; an item of hardware.
3. A project or scheme, often designed to deceive; a stratagem; an artifice. 1602, Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor. "This is our device,/ That Falstaff at that oak shall meet with us."

   “His device is against Babylon, to destroy it.”

   “He disappointeth the devices of the crafty, so that their hands cannot perform their enterprise.”

   “Their recent device of demanding benevolences.”

   “So next day the hunting began. I did not know how to shoot, but I proceeded to learn. And when I had expended some thirty shells for three seals, I decided that the ammunition would be exhausted before I acquired the necessary knowledge. I had used eight shells for lighting fires before I hit upon the device of banking the embers with wet moss, and there remained not over a hundred shells in the box.”

   “FOR a month Tarzan was a regular and very welcome devotee at the shrine of the beautiful Countess de Coude. […] More often Olga found devices that would give her an hour of Tarzan alone.”

4. (Ireland)An improvised explosive device, home-made bomb

   “Inflammable material is planted in my head / It's a suspect device that's left 2000 dead”

   “THE ARMY BOMB Disposal Team rendered safe a viable device in Cavan this afternoon.”

   “The army bomb squad carried out two controlled explosions on the device. It was later found that the suspect device was a hoax and not a viable explosive.”

5. (rhetoric)A technique that an author or speaker uses to evoke an emotional response in the audience; a rhetorical device.

   “1736. O'Callaghan, Edmund Bailey. The Documentary History of the State of New York Chapter I, Article III: Enumeration of the Indian Tribes. The devices of these savages are the serpent, the Deer, and the Small Acorn.”

6. (rhetoric)A technique that an author or speaker uses to evoke an emotional response in the audience; a rhetorical device. (heraldry) A motto, emblem, or other mark used to distinguish the bearer from others. A device differs from a badge or cognizance primarily as it is a personal distinction, and not a badge borne by members of the same house successively.
7. (archaic)Power of devising; invention; contrivance.

   “Moreover I must have instruments of mine own device, weighty, and exceeding costly”

   “And she said, "We are all prisoners here, Of our own device"”

   “I want to (I must) tell a story of a revelation in my life. His name is Vernon. We have known each other for 17 years, yet we are presently separated through no device of our own making.”

8. An image used in whole or in part as a trademark or service mark.
9. An image or logo denoting official or proprietary authority or provenience.

   “Prior to the issuance of the first stamps, letters accepted by postmasters for dispatch were marked "Paid" by means of pen and ink or hand stamps of various designs. … To facilitate the handling of mail matter, some postmasters provided special stamps or devices for use on letters as evidence of the prepayment of postage.”

10. Any specific class of wordplay element in a cryptic crossword.

    “These eight devices, and combinations thereof, account for nearly every kind of wordplay you will encounter in cryptic crosswords.”

    “Discovering these variants is much of the fun. All the devices can be combined and twisted to produce surface readings in each clue which point you in the wrong direction.”

    “As with all varieties of cryptic clues, the container device can be used in conjunction with other devices, especially in more complex cryptic crosswords.”

11. (obsolete)A spectacle or show.

    “It will be out of faſhion to weare ſwords, / Maſques, and devices welcome, I ſalute you […]”

12. (obsolete)Opinion; decision.