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Possesses vs Owns - What's the difference?

possesses | owns |

As verbs the difference between possesses and owns

is that possesses is (possess) while owns is (own).

possesses

English

Verb

(head)
  • (possess)

  • possess

    English

    Verb

    (es)
  • To have; to have ownership of.
  • * 1818 , (Mary Shelley), (Frankenstein) , Volume 3, Chapter 7:
  • [...], the companions of our childhood always possess a certain power over our minds, which hardly any later friend can obtain.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1922, author=(Ben Travers), title=(A Cuckoo in the Nest)
  • , chapter=1 citation , passage=He read the letter aloud. Sophia listened with the studied air of one for whom, even in these days, a title possessed some surreptitious allurement.}}
  • To take control of someone's body or mind, especially in a supernatural manner.
  • To vest ownership in (someone); to give someone power or knowledge; to acquaint; to inform.
  • * 1599 , (William Shakespeare), (Much Ado About Nothing) ,
  • LEONATO. I cannot bid you bid my daughter live;
    That were impossible; but, I pray you both,
    Possess the people in Messina here
    How innocent she died;
  • * 1599 , (William Shakespeare), (Twelfth Night) , II, 3
  • [Sir Toby Belch] Possess' us, '''possess' us ; tell us something of him.

    Quotations

    *

    Synonyms

    * seise * (qualities or characteristics) inhold

    owns

    English

    Verb

    (head)
  • (own)
  • Anagrams

    * * * *

    own

    English

    Etymology 1

    (wikipedia own) From (etyl) (m), from (etyl) , (etyl) (m). See also the related term (m).

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (lb) To have rightful possession of (property, goods or capital); "To possess by right; to have the right of property in; to have the legal right or rightful title to." (Ref 1)
  • I own this car.
  • (lb) To admit, concede, grant, allow, acknowledge, confess; not to deny.
  • * 1902 , Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness , Tank Books 2007, p. 25:
  • I am sorry to own I began to worry then.
  • * 1913 ,
  • They learned how perfectly peaceful the home could be. And they almost regretted—though none of them would have owned to such callousness—that their father was soon coming back.
  • (lb) To claim as one's own; to answer to.
  • * 1851 , Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
  • I own thy speechless, placeless power; but to the last gasp of my earthquake life will dispute its unconditional, unintegral mastery in me.
  • (lb) To acknowledge or admit the possession or ownership of. (Ref 3)
  • (lb) To defeat or embarrass; to overwhelm.
  • I will own my enemies.
    If he wins, he will own you.
  • (lb) To virtually or figuratively enslave.
  • To defeat, dominate, or be above, also spelled (m).
  • To illicitly obtain "super-user" or "root" access into a computer system thereby having access to all of the user files on that system; pwn.
  • Synonyms
    * (have rightful possession of) to possess * (acknowledge responsibility for) be responsible for, admit or take responsibility for * (admit) confess, acknowledge, allow * (defeat) beat, defeat, overcome, overthrow, vanquish, have, take, best
    Derived terms
    * owndom * own up * owner * pwn * disown

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) (m), .

    Alternative forms

    * (informal contraction)

    Adjective

    (en determiner)
  • Belonging to; possessed; proper to.
  • *
  • , title=(The Celebrity), chapter=8 , passage=I corralled the judge, and we started off across the fields, in no very mild state of fear of that gentleman's wife, whose vigilance was seldom relaxed. And thus we came by a circuitous route to Mohair, the judge occupied by his own guilty thoughts, and I by others not less disturbing.}}
  • * , chapter=10
  • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=He looked round the poor room, at the distempered walls, and the bad engravings in meretricious frames, the crinkly paper and wax flowers on the chiffonier; and he thought of a room like Father Bryan's, with panelling, with cut glass, with tulips in silver pots, such a room as he had hoped to have for his own .}}
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-21, author=(Oliver Burkeman)
  • , volume=189, issue=2, page=27, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= The tao of tech , passage=The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about […], or offering services that let you
  • (obsolete) Peculiar, domestic.
  • (obsolete) Not foreign.
  • Usage notes
    * implying ownership, often with emphasis. It always follows a possessive pronoun, or a noun in the possessive case.
    Derived terms
    * come into one's own * on one's own

    Etymology 3

    From (etyl) is attested. Etymology] of the German cognate in [[:w:de:Deutsches Wörterbuch, Deutsches Wörterbuch]

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (obsolete) To grant; give.
  • To admit; concede; acknowledge.
  • * 1611 , Shakespeare, The Tempest , v.:
  • Two of those fellows you must know and own .
  • * 1843 , (Thomas Carlyle), '', book 2, ch. 1, ''Jocelin of Brakelond
  • It must be owned , the good Jocelin, spite of his beautiful childlike character, is but an altogether imperfect 'mirror' of these old-world things!
  • To recognise; acknowledge.
  • to own one as a son
  • To confess.
  • Statistics

    *

    References

    * 1896 , Universal Dictionary of the English Language [UDEL] , v3 p3429: *: To possess by right; to have the right of property in; to have the legal right or rightful title to. * 1896 , ibid., UDEL * 1896 , ibid., UDEL * 1896 , ibid., UDEL * Notes: