From Middle English mechanical, mechanicalle, mechanycalle, equivalent to mechanic + -al.

• (British) IPA: /məˈkænɪkəl/
• (America) IPA: /məˈkænəkəl/

mechanical

1. (now rare) Characteristic of someone who does manual labour for a living; coarse, vulgar.
   • c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act V, scene v]:

     Thy Doll, and Helen of thy noble thoughts,
     Is in base durance and contagious prison,
     Haled thither by most mechanical and dirty hand.

   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 43, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC ↗:

     all manner of silks were already become so vile and abject, that was any man seene to weare them, he was presently judged to be some countrie fellow, or mechanicall man.

2. Related to mechanics the branch of physics that deals with forces acting on mass.

   mechanical engineering

3. Related to mechanics the design and construction of machines.

   mechanical dictionary

4. Done by machine.

   mechanical task

5. Using mechanics the design and construction of machines: being a machine.

   mechanical arm

6. (figurative) As if performed by a machine: lifeless, mindless, thoughtless, automatic.

   a mechanical reply to a question

7. (of a person) Acting as if one were a machine: lifeless or mindless.

   The pianist was too mechanical.

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC ↗:

     Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.

8. (informal) Handy with machines.

   Why don't you ask Joe to fix it? He's very mechanical.

• mechanic
• mechanics
• mechanism

• French: mécanique
• German: mechanisch
• Italian: meccanico
• Portuguese: mecânico
• Russian: механи́ческий
• Spanish: mecánico

• Portuguese: mecânico

• Portuguese: mecânico

• Portuguese: mecânico

• French: machinal
• Portuguese: mecânico

• Portuguese: mecânico

• Portuguese: mecânico

mechanical (plural mechanicals)

1. (advertising) Manually created layout of artwork that is camera ready for photographic reproduction.
2. One who does manual labor, especially one who is similar to Shakespeare's rude mechanicals
3. (science fiction) A robot or mechanical creature.
4. (engineering) A mechanical engineer.
5. (bicycling) An instance of equipment failure.
6. (music) A stop on an organ that is operated by a hand or foot control rather than having to be manually set up in advance.
7. (archaic) A machine that performs a job typically accomplished using an animal or manual labor.

• (camera-ready artwork) pasteup