Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To reduce the length of (a written text); condense.
- v. To cut short; curtail. See Synonyms at shorten.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To make shorter; curtail: as, “abridged cloaks,” Scott, Ivanhoe, xiv. To shorten by condensation or omission, or both; rewrite or reconstruct on a smaller scale; put the main or essential parts of into less space: used of writings: as, Justin abridged the history of Trogus Pompeius.
- To lessen; diminish: as, to abridge labor.
- To deprive; cut off: followed by of, and formerly also by from: as, to abridge one of rights or enjoyments.
- In algebra, to reduce, as a compound quantity or equation, to a more simple form. Synonyms To cut down, prune. See
abbreviate . To dispossess, divest, strip, despoil.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To make shorter; to shorten in duration; to lessen; to diminish; to curtail
- v. To shorten or contract by using fewer words, yet retaining the sense; to epitomize; to condense.
- v. To deprive; to cut off; -- followed by
of , and formerly byfrom .
WordNet 3.0
- v. lessen, diminish, or curtail
- v. reduce in scope while retaining essential elements
Etymologies
- Middle English abregen, from Old French abregier, from Late Latin abbreviāre, to shorten; see abbreviate. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“And Anne, you seem to think Arabs 'abridge' the human rights of Jews, a month after Israel killed 1300 Palestinians, maimed thousands more, refuses to lift the blockade etc etc etc.”
On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with...
“Constitution that Congress can't begin to 'abridge' it, in its pride of place, is hawked at by this crested jay-bird.”
“One could argue that such restrictions "abridge" the freedom of the press, but that argument would be specious.”
“Our bar has been lowered way too far allowing laws to abridge individual freedoms in exchange for a nanny state.”
“He therefore was commissioned to abridge and write a preface to a now obscure work of mental philosophy, The Light of Nature Pursued by Abraham Tucker (originally published in seven volumes from 1768 to 1777), which appeared in 1807 and may have had some influence on his own later thinking.”
william hazlitt | the man of letters « poetry dispatch & other notes from the underground
“We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others necessities.”
“In short, a commonplace book blog: A place to quote, abridge, and commonplace passages of rhetorical, dialectic and factual interest, mix them with comment and reflection, and index them to facilitate retrieval and use, notably in the composition of my own prose.”
“I promised you some account of my short excursion to Dorking during the late vacant days of my employment; and I must abridge my plan I perceive before I begin, as I have other letters to write.”
“David Axelrod, a senior campaign adviser to President Barack Obama, said the administration had heard the Roman Catholic Church's concerns and never intended to "abridge anyone's religious freedom.”
The Huffington Post: Wade Norris: Rick Santorum's Red Badge of 'Savage'
“Increasingly, we have let our elected officials abridge our own economic freedoms through the annual passage of thousands of laws and their associated regulations.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘abridge’.
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GRE 2014
abase, abate, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abjure, abortive, abound, abrasive, abreast, abridge and 1577 more...
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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my fab list
blowsabella, aperçu, froideur, salubrious, abject, gallipot, mumchance, wainscot, virago, macerate, lascivious, clandestine and 181 more...
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INTERP - terminology management terms
Terms from the fields of terminology, lexicography, lexicology and corpus linguistics
reworder, rewording, parser, parsing, tagger, tagging, aligner, aligning, content analysis, content analyzer, corpus management, glossary and 546 more...
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EN - eloquence in public speaking
Key words from "The Training of a Public Speaker" by Grenville Kleiser (New York and London, 1920)
beget, imago, approbation, orator, peroration, Cicero, eloquence, elocution, rhetoric, premeditate, plead, Isocrates and 264 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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my gre list
its my gre word lists
abeyance, aberr, abash, abide, abhor, abject, abjure, ablution, abode, abolish, abominable, aboriginal and 19 more...
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5000 FREE SAT Words
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 229 more...
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My GRE Vocab
moniker, sobriquet, prerogative, aberration, aberrant, nuance, notorious, infamous, renown, allude, refer, content and 109 more...
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Shorten
Verbs meaning shorten
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Words I Know
List of most of the words I've learned
garner, abase, abate, abdicate, abduct, aberration, abet, abhor, abide, abject, abjure, abnegation and 1046 more...
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eggplantia5's Words
scintillate, marvel, cranberry, oscillate, triumph, bamboozle, grimace, magical, book, hexagon, cipher, compendium and 2727 more...
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GRE
abate, abdicate, aberrant, abhor, abjure, abrasive, abridge, abstain, acme, activism, adhere, admonish and 195 more...
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SAT Vocab
Redundant.
problematic, proclivity, prodigal, prodigious, prodigy, profane, profligate, profound, profusion, proliferation, prolific, prologue and 455 more...
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SAT PSAT ALPHABETICAL A
abandon, abash, abate, abjure, ablution, abnegate, abominable, aboriginal, abortive, abrade, abridge, abrogate and 172 more...
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GRE
Taisha GRE Bible
archaic, archetype, archipelago, architect, archive, arctic, ardor, arduous, argot, arid, armory, arrest and 289 more...
Tweets
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