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Acquire vs Amass - What's the difference?

acquire | amass |

In transitive terms the difference between acquire and amass

is that acquire is to gain, usually by one's own exertions; to get as one's own, as, to acquire a title, riches, knowledge, skill, good or bad habits while amass is to collect into a mass or heap; to gather a great quantity of; to accumulate.

As a noun amass is

a mass; a heap.

acquire

English

Verb

(acquir)
  • To get.
  • To gain, usually by one's own exertions; to get as one's own, as, to acquire a title, riches, knowledge, skill, good or bad habits.
  • * (Isaac Barrow) (1630-1677)
  • No virtue is acquired in an instant, but step by step.
  • * (William Blackstone) (1723-1780)
  • Descent is the title whereby a man, on the death of his ancestor, acquires his estate, by right of representation, as his heir at law.
  • *{{quote-book, year=1922, author=(Michael Arlen), chapter=3/19/2, title= “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days
  • , passage=Ivor had acquired more than a mile of fishing rights with the house?; he was not at all a good fisherman, but one must do something?; one generally, however, banged a ball with a squash-racket against a wall.}}

    Synonyms

    * attain, earn, gain, obtain, procure, secure, win

    Derived terms

    * acquired taste

    amass

    English

    Verb

    (es)
  • To collect into a mass or heap; to gather a great quantity of; to accumulate.
  • to amass a treasure or a fortune; to amass words or phrases
  • * 1887 , , A Study in Scarlet , Part II, Chapter V, page 123:
  • he reluctantly returned to the old Nevada mines, there to recruit his health and to amass money enough to allow him to pursue his object without privation.

    Synonyms

    * accumulate, heap up, pile

    Noun

    (es)
  • (obsolete) A mass; a heap.
  • * Thomas Pownall
  • a general idea of an amass of arms
    (Webster 1913)

    Anagrams

    *