Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary - pawn

(pawns, pawning, pawned) 1. If you pawn something that you own, you leave it with a pawnbroker, who gives you money for it and who can sell it if you do not pay back the money before a certain time. He is contemplating pawning his watch. VERB: V n 2. In chess, a pawn is the smallest and least valuable playing piece. Each player has eight pawns at the start of the game. N-COUNT 3. If you say that someone is using you as a pawn, you mean that they are using you for their own advantage. It looks as though he is being used as a political pawn by the President... N-COUNT: usu with supp, oft N in n