Remove Definition

remove

English

Etymology

From Middle English remeven, removen, from Anglo-Norman remuver, removeir, from Old French remouvoir, from Latin removēre, from re- + movēre (“to move”)

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ɹɪˈmuːv/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -uːv

Verb

remove (third-person singular simple present removes, present participle removing, simple past and past participle removed)

1. (transitive) To move something from one place to another, especially to take away.

   He removed the marbles from the bag.

2. (transitive) To murder someone.
3. (cricket),(transitive) To dismiss a batsman.
4. (transitive) To discard, set aside (a thought, feeling etc.).
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.viii:

     Die had she rather in tormenting griefe, / Then any should of falsenesse her reproue, / Or loosenesse, that she lightly did remoue.

5. (intransitive, now rare) To depart, leave.
   • 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, Le Morte Darthur, Book V:

     And loke that ye ryde streyte unto Sir Lucius and sey I bydde hym in haste to remeve oute of my londys.

6. (intransitive) To change one's residence.
   • 1719 Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe

     Now my life began to be so easy that I began to say to myself that could I but have been safe from more savages, I cared not if I was never to remove from the place where I lived.

   • 1834, David Crockett, A Narrative of the Life of, Nebraska 1987, p. 20:

     Shortly after this, my father removed, and settled in the same county, about ten miles above Greenville.

Antonyms

• add

Derived terms

• removable
• removal
• remover

Noun

remove (plural removes)

1. The act of removing something, especially removing a dish at a meal in order to replace it with the next course
2. A dish thus replaced, or the replacement
3. (UK) (at some public schools) A division of the school, especially the form prior to last
4. A step or gradation (as in the phrase "at one remove")
5. Distance in time or space
   • 2007, James D. McCallister, King's Highway, page 162:

     In his unfortunate absence at this far remove of 2007, Zevon's musicianship and irascible wit are as missed as ever.

References

• OED 2nd edition 1989

Latin

Verb

removē

1. second-person singular present active imperative of removeō

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