Dry vs Dessicate - What's the difference?
dry | dessicate |
Free from liquid or moisture.
* Addison
* Prescott
(chemistry) Free of water in any state; anhydrous.
Thirsty; needing drink.
* (William Shakespeare)
(of an alcoholic beverage) Lacking sugar or low in sugar; not sweet.
Maintaining temperance; void or abstinent from alcoholic beverages.
(of a person or joke) Subtly humorous, yet without mirth.
* (Washington Irving)
(of a scientist or his laboratory) Not working with chemical or biological matter, but, rather, doing computations.
(masonry) Built without mortar; dry-stone.
*
(of animals) Not giving milk.
Lacking interest or amusement; barren; unembellished.
* (Alexander Pope)
(fine arts) Exhibiting a sharp, frigid preciseness of execution, or lacking delicate contours and soft transitions of colour.
To lose moisture.
To remove moisture from.
(ambitransitive, figurative) To cease or cause to cease.
As an acronym dry
is (computing).As a verb dessicate is
.dry
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) drye, drie, dri, drige, dryge, . See also (l), (l), (l).Alternative forms
* (l) (obsolete)Adjective
(en-adj)- The weather, we agreed, was too dry for the season.
- Not a dry eye was to be seen in the assembly.
- Give the dry fool drink.
- He was rather a dry , shrewd kind of body.
- These epistles will become less dry , more susceptible of ornament.
Synonyms
* (free from liquid or moisture) arid, parchedAntonyms
* (free from liquid or moisture) wet * (abstinent from alcohol) wet * wetDerived terms
* bone dry * dry as a bone * dry as a dead dingo’s donger * dry cough * dry hole * dry ice * drily * dry run * dryly * dryness * dry spell * drywall * dry weight * like watching paint dryEtymology 2
From (etyl)Verb
- The clothes dried on the line.
- Devin dried her eyes with a handkerchief.
- Their sources of income dried up.
- The stream of chatter dried up.