Corruption of earlier cartage, from French cartouche, from Italian cartoccio, from Medieval Latin carta.

• (British) IPA: /ˈkɑːtɹɪdʒ/
• (America) enPR: kärʹtrĭj, IPA: /ˈkɑɹtɹɪd͡ʒ/

cartridge (plural cartridges)

1. (firearms) The package consisting of the bullet, primer, and casing containing gunpowder; a round of ammunition.
   • 1907 January, Harold Bindloss, chapter 7, in The Dust of Conflict, 1st Canadian edition, Toronto, Ont.: McLeod & Allen, →OCLC ↗:

     Still, a dozen men with rifles, and cartridges to match, stayed behind when they filed through a white aldea lying silent amid the cane, and the Sin Verguenza swung into slightly quicker stride.

2. (by extension) A prefabricated subassembly that can be easily installed in or removed from a larger mechanism or replaced with another interchangeable subassembly.
3. (computing) A vessel which contains the ink or toner for a computer printer and can be easily replaced with another.
4. (computing) Magnetic tape storage, used for storing (backup) copies of data.
5. (computing) A removable enclosure containing read-only memory devices, used for rapid loading of software onto a home computer or video game console.
   • 1981, Communication Outlook, volume 3:

     We would like to see someone market a low-power, text-to-speech cartridge that would mate with the Epson and use its internal battery pack.

   • 2002, Video Game Bible, 1985-2002, page 180:

     Nintendo made sure to loudly trumpet all of the advantages of the cartridge format, particularly the greatly reduced loading times and the sturdiness of the cartridges […]

6. (obsolete) A small paper package, e.g. in an old book about making printer's type: After all the type has been cast: "The Boy will paper up each sort in a cartridge by itself".

• French: cartouche
• German: Patrone
• Italian: cartuccia
• Portuguese: cartucho, pente
• Russian: патро́н
• Spanish: cartucho, cartuchera

• French: cartouche
• German: Patrone, Kartusche
• Italian: cartuccia
• Portuguese: cartucho
• Russian: ка́ртридж
• Spanish: cartucho, cartucho de tinta

• Portuguese: cartucho, fita

1. Surname.