gather English
Verb
( en verb)
To collect; normally separate things.
- I've been gathering ideas from the people I work with.
- She bent down to gather the reluctant cat from beneath the chair.
# Especially, to harvest food.
- We went to gather some blackberries from the nearby lane.
# To accumulate over time, to amass little by little.
- Over the years he'd gathered a considerable collection of mugs.
# To congregate, or assemble.
- People gathered round as he began to tell his story.
#* Tennyson
- Tears from the depth of some divine despair / Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes.
# To grow gradually larger by accretion.
#* Francis Bacon
- Their snowball did not gather as it went.
To bring parts of a whole closer.
- She gathered the shawl about her as she stepped into the cold.
# (sewing) To add pleats or folds to a piece of cloth, normally to reduce its width.
- A gown should be gathered around the top so that it will remain shaped.
# (knitting) To bring stitches closer together.
- Be careful not to stretch or gather your knitting.
- If you want to emphasise the shape, it is possible to gather the waistline.
# (architecture) To bring together, or nearer together, in masonry, as for example where the width of a fireplace is rapidly diminished to the width of the flue.
# (nautical) To haul in; to take up.
- to gather the slack of a rope
To infer or conclude; to know from a different source.
- From his silence, I gathered that things had not gone well.
- I gather from Aunty May that you had a good day at the match.
(intransitive, medicine, of a boil or sore) To be filled with pus
- Salt water can help boils to gather and then burst.
(glassblowing) To collect molten glass on the end of a tool.
To gain; to win.
* Dryden
- He gathers ground upon her in the chase.
Noun
( en noun)
A plait or fold in cloth, made by drawing a thread through it; a pucker.
The inclination forward of the axle journals to keep the wheels from working outward.
The soffit or under surface of the masonry required in gathering. See gather (transitive verb).
(glassblowing) A blob of molten glass collected on the end of a blowpipe.
Derived terms
* gathering iron
|
warn English
Etymology 1
(etyl) warnian, from (etyl) . Cognate with German warnen, Dutch waarnen.
Verb
( en verb)
To make (someone) aware of impending danger etc.
- We waved a flag to warn the oncoming traffic.
To caution (someone) against unwise or unacceptable behaviour.
- He was warned against crossing the railway tracks at night.
- Don't let me catch you running in the corridor again, I warn you.
To notify (someone) of something untoward.
- I phoned to warn him of the rail strike.
To give warning.
* 1526 , William Tyndale, tr. Bible , Galatians II, 9-10:
- then Iames Cephas and Iohn [...] agreed with vs that we shuld preache amonge the Hethen and they amonge the Iewes: warnynge only that we shulde remember the poore.
* 1973 , Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow , Penguin 1995, p. 177:
- She is his deepest innocence in spaces of bough and hay before wishes were given a different name to warn that they might not come true [...].
* 1988 , Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses , Picador 2000, p. 496:
- She warned that he was seriously thinking of withdrawing his offer to part the waters, ‘so that all you'll get at the Arabian Sea is a saltwater bath [...]’.
* 1991 , Clive James, ‘Making Programmes the World Wants’, The Dreaming Swimmer , Jonathan Cape 1992:
- Every country has its resident experts who warn that imported television will destroy the national consciousness and replace it with Dallas'', ''The Waltons'', ''Star Trek'' and ''Twin Peaks .
Usage notes
* The intransitive sense is considered colloquial by some, and is explicitly proscribed by, for example, the Daily Telegraph style guide (which prefers give warning).
Derived terms
* warner
* warning
* warn off
Etymology 2
From a combination of (etyl) wiernan (from (etyl) ; compare Swedish varna).
Verb
( en verb)
(label) To refuse, deny (someone something).
*:
*:And yf thou warne' her loue she shalle goo dye anone yf thou haue no pyte on her / that sygnefyeth the grete byrd / the whiche shalle make the to ' warne her
|
