Smother vs Under - What's the difference?
smother | under |
To suffocate; stifle; obstruct, more or less completely, the respiration of.
To extinguish or deaden, as fire, by covering, overlaying, or otherwise excluding the air: as, to smother a fire with ashes.
To reduce to a low degree of vigor or activity; suppress or do away with; extinguish; stifle; cover up; conceal; hide: as, the committee's report was smothered.
In cookery: to cook in a close dish: as, beefsteak smothered with onions.
To daub or smear.
To be suffocated.
To breathe with great difficulty by reason of smoke, dust, close covering or wrapping, or the like.
Of a fire: to burn very slowly for want of air; smolder.
Figuratively: to perish, grow feeble, or decline, by suppression or concealment; be stifled; be suppressed or concealed.
(soccer) To get in the way of a kick of the ball
* {{quote-news
, year=2011
, date=December 27
, author=Mike Henson
, title=Norwich 0 - 2 Tottenham
, work=BBC Sport
(Australian rules football) To get in the way of a kick of the ball, preventing it going very far. When a player is kicking the ball, an opponent who is close enough will reach out with his hands and arms to get over the top of it, so the ball hits his hands after leaving the kicker's boot, dribbling away.
That which smothers or appears to smother, particularly
# Smoldering; slow combustion
# Cookware used in such cooking
# The state of being stifled; suppression.
#* Francis Bacon
# Stifling smoke; thick dust.
# (Australian rules football) The act of smothering a kick (see above).
In or at a lower level than.
* 1922 , (Virginia Woolf), (w, Jacob's Room) Chapter 1
* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
, chapter=14 * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-29, volume=407, issue=8842, page=28, magazine=(The Economist)
, title= As a subject of; subordinate to.
* {{quote-news, year=2012, date=May 5, author=Phil McNulty, title=Chelsea 2-1 Liverpool
, work=BBC Sport * {{quote-news, year=2011, date=December 14, author=Angelique Chrisafis
, title=Rachida Dati accuses French PM of sexism and elitism, work=Guardian
Less than.
Below the surface of.
(figuratively) In the face of; in response to (some attacking force).
* 2011 , Tom Fordyce, Rugby World Cup 2011: England 12-19 France [http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/15210221.stm]
As, in the character of.
* 2013 , The Huffington Post, JK Rowling Pseudonym: Robert Galbraith's 'The Cuckoo's Calling' Is Actually By Harry Potter Author [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/13/jk-rowling-pseudonym-robert-galbraith_n_3592769.html]
In a way lower or less than.
* (rfexample)
In a way inferior to.
* (rfexample)
In an unconscious state.
Being lower; being beneath something.
* Bible, 1 Corinthians ix. 27
* Moore
*
*
*
As a verb smother
is to suffocate; stifle; obstruct, more or less completely, the respiration of.As a noun smother
is that which smothers or appears to smother, particularlyAs a preposition under is
in or at a lower level than.As an adverb under is
in a way lower or less than.As an adjective under is
being lower; being beneath something.smother
English
Alternative forms
* (l) (obsolete)Etymology 1
From (etyl) smothren, smortheren, alteration (due to smother, .Verb
(en verb)citation, page= , passage=Emmanuel Adebayor's touch proved a fraction heavy as he guided Van der Vaart's exquisite long ball round John Ruddy, before the goalkeeper did well to smother Bale's shot from Modric's weighted pass.}}
Etymology 2
From (etyl) smother, .Noun
(en noun)- not to keep their suspicions in smother
- (Shakespeare)
References
*Anagrams
* *under
English
Preposition
(English prepositions)- The little boys in the front bedroom had thrown off their blankets and lay under the sheets.
citation, passage=Nanny Broome was looking up at the outer wall. Just under the ceiling there were three lunette windows, heavily barred and blacked out in the normal way by centuries of grime.}}
High and wet, passage=Floods in northern India, mostly in the small state of Uttarakhand, have wrought disaster on an enormous scale.
citation, passage=He was then denied by a magnificent tackle from captain Terry as Liverpool continued to press - but Chelsea survived as the memories of the nightmare under Villas-Boas faded even further into the background.}}
citation, passage=Dati launched a blistering attack on the prime minister, François Fillon, under whom she served as justice minister, accusing him of sexism, elitism, arrogance and hindering the political advancement of ethnic minorities.}}
- England's World Cup dreams fell apart under a French onslaught on a night when their shortcomings were brutally exposed at the quarter-final stage.
- J.K. Rowling has written a crime novel called 'The Cuckoo's Calling' under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith.
Synonyms
* below * beneath * underneathAntonyms
* above * overAdverb
(-)- It took the hypnotist several minutes to make his subject go under .
Synonyms
* below * beneathAntonyms
* above * overAdjective
(en adjective)- I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection.
- The minstrel fell, but the foeman's chain / Could not bring his proud soul under .