burn

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Just as a third degree burn is the most severe and damaging type, so giving somebody the third degree is the most extreme method of questioning.

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Definitions (135)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (63)

  1. transitive verb To cause to undergo combustion.
  2. transitive verb To destroy with fire: burned the trash; burn a house down.
  3. transitive verb To consume (fuel or energy, for example): burned all the wood that winter.
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Burn has been looked up 515 times, favorited 0 times, listed 34 times, and commented on 5 times.

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Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

flame ·  wound ·  smoke ·  injury ·  heat ·  cut ·  glow ·  explosion ·  burst ·  bruise ·  scar ·  pain
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (7)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. Middle English burnen, from Old English beornan, to be on fire, and from bærnan, to set on fire; see gwher- in Indo-European roots.
  2. Middle English, from Old English burna; see bhreu- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (5)

  1. Under this form and the obsolete or dial. brin, bren, brun, are now confused two different but related verbs, which are quite distinct in Anglo-Saxon and the other older tongues: (1) burn, from Middle English bernen, bærnen, barnen, brennen, from Anglo-Saxon bærnan (preterit bærnde, past participle bærned) = Old Saxon brennian = Middle Dutch bernen (in modern D. displaced by the secondary form branden: see brand, v.) = Low German brennen = OFries. berna, barna = Old High German brennan, Middle High German G. brennen = Icelandic brenna = Swedish bränna = Danish brænde = Gothic (Moesogothic) brannjan (in comp.), burn, consume with fire, orig. and properly transitive, a weak verb, factitive of the next; (2) burn, from Middle English birnen, beornen, brinnen, from Anglo-Saxon beornan, byrnan (preterit barn, bearn, plural burnon, past participle bornen), a transposed form of brinnan (in comp. on-brinnan) = Old Saxon brinnan = Old High German brinnan, Middle High German German dial. brinnen = Icelandic brenna, older brinna, = Gothic (Moesogothic) brinnan, burn, be on fire; orig. and properly intransitive, a strong verb; not known outside of Teutonic Deriv. brand, brine, perhaps burn = bourn, etc.
  2. from burn, v.
  3. Also written bourn, bourne, which with a different pron. is the usual form in the south of England (see bourn, bourne); from Middle English bourne, commonly burne, from Anglo-Saxon burna, masculine, also burne, feminine, a brook, stream (= Old Saxon brunno = OFries. burna = Old Dutch borne, Dutch born, bron = Low German born (later G. born) = Old High German brunno, Middle High German brunne, German brunnen, brunne, brunn = Icelandic brunnr = Swedish brunn = Danish brönd, a spring, fountain, well, = Gothic (Moesogothic) brunna, a spring), prob. from brinnan (past participle *brunnen), etc., burn: see burn. Cf. the similar origin of well and torrent. Not connected with Greek φρέαρ, a well.
  4. Middle English, from Old French burnir, burnish: see burnish. In form and sense the word overlaps burn (cf. burn, v. i., 4).
  5. apparently contr. of burthen or burden.
 

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