Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To take in as food; eat or drink up. See Synonyms at eat.
- v. To expend; use up: engines that consume less fuel; a project that consumed most of my time and energy.
- v. To purchase (goods or services) for direct use or ownership.
- v. To waste; squander. See Synonyms at waste.
- v. To destroy totally; ravage: flames that consumed the house; a body consumed by cancer.
- v. To absorb; engross: consumed with jealousy. See Synonyms at monopolize.
- v. To be destroyed, expended, or wasted.
- v. To purchase economic goods and services: a society that consumes as fast as it produces.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To destroy by separating into parts which cannot be reunited, as by decomposition, burning, or eating; devour; use up; wear out; hence, destroy the substance of; annihilate.
- Specifically To destroy by use; dissipate or wear out (a thing) by applying it to its natural or intended use: as, only a, small part of the produce of the West is consumed there; in an unfavorable sense, waste; squander: as, to consume an estate.
- To cause to waste away; make thin.
- To bring to utter ruin; exterminate.
- To make use of; employ the whole of; fill out; spend: with reference to time.
- Synonyms Devour, etc. (see eat); swallow up, use up, engulf, absorb, lavish, dissipate, exhust.
- To waste (away); become wasted or attenuated.
- To be destroyed as by use, burning, etc: as, the fire was lighted, and the wood consumed away.
Wiktionary
- v. transitive To use.
- v. transitive To eat.
- v. transitive To completely occupy the thoughts or attention of.
- v. transitive To destroy completely.
- v. intransitive, obsolete To waste away slowly.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To destroy, as by decomposition, dissipation, waste, or fire; to use up; to expend; to waste; to burn up; to eat up; to devour.
- v. To waste away slowly.
WordNet 3.0
- v. use up (resources or materials)
- v. serve oneself to, or consume regularly
- v. engage fully
- v. spend extravagantly
- v. destroy completely
- v. eat immoderately
Etymologies
- From Latin consumere. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English consumen, from Latin cōnsūmere : com-, intensive pref.; see com- + sūmere, to take; see em- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The word consume comes from the Latin con - altogether + sumere - to take up, lay hold of, etc.”
“That abundance of food, of which, in consequence of the improvement of land, many people have the disposal beyond what they themselves can consume, is the great cause of the demand both for precious metals and the precious stones, as well as for every other conveniency and ornament of dress, lodging, household furniture, and equipage.”
“Here in America, we believe in the right to choose for ourselves on many issues, and what we consume is one of those areas where people do not want the gov't telling them what they can and can't do.”
“To assume we need to to produce what we consume is no longer true as the entire world stands ready to furnish employment with the level of educational credentials needed.”
East Aurora School District 131 | What's the Progress for One of Aurora's Most Serious Challenges?
“The Seattle P.I. reports that "two-thirds of the honey Americans consume is imported and almost half of that, regardless of what's on the label, comes from China.”
Who's Watching Our Nation's Honey Imports? Pretty Much No One - The Consumerist
“ALL of these have an effect on how the wine we consume is perceived – whether you accept that or not.”
Study: points influence consumer perceptions! | Dr Vino's wine blog
“How hard they have to work to produce what we consume is not fixed.”
Taxes and Social Security, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“Research has shown both companies that most of the water they consume is used for growing ingredients rather than in the manufacturing process itself.”
The Guardian: Pepsi takes fight with Coca-Cola into potato fields
“The chocolate I consume, and it isn't much that I do consume, is nearly devoid of sugar and definitely contains no friggin 'milk, dag nabbit!”
“Incandescents have drawn criticism from environmentalists in recent years because most of the power they consume is released as heat, so they need to use a ton of energy to produce light.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘consume’.
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EN - academic vocabulary
Use these and get promoted
abandon, abandonment, abnormally, abstract, abstraction, abstractly, abstracts, academia, academic, academically, academics, academies and 3119 more...
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RELI - Genesis
Protagonists and relevant words in the Book of Creation (Source: King James Bible)
Laban, circumcise, beget, Esau, Rebekah, speckle, Sodom, Pharaoh, Canaanite, Canaan, Jacob, Lot and 1286 more...
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LIT - Odyssey - key words and phrases
Key words of the Odyssey by Homer in English including all those famous repeating epitethons like
"bright-eyed Athene"
"wine-dark sea"
"rosy-fingered dawn"
"long suf...Odysseus, sea, Athene, goddess, land, Achaean, wind, wave, Ithaca, lead, Poseidon, mortal and 732 more...
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LIT - Iliad - key words and protagonists
abduct, abducting, abductor, Achaea, Achaean, Achilles, advise, Aegean, Aegean Sea, Aegina, aegis, Aeneas and 713 more...
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Alternatives to DRINK
drink is a boring word.
absorb, consume, dissipate, gulp, indulge, swallow, imbibe, sip, fill, quaff, chug, slug and 2 more...
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Tourism Department. Unit 4
takeover, merger, reach, challenge, holidaymakers, profit, saturation, profitability, significant, sign, signature, success and 36 more...
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Let's Eat!
Eating Verbs
boil, break bread, breakfast, chew, chomp, chow down, consume, cram, devour, diet, digest, dig in and 48 more...
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ChortleGiggleSnort
Significant Words- Guiding you on your path to Snazzibility
flimsy, feeble, ranting, ramble, narky, snazzy, yoghurt, bulbous, pustule, globulous, geranium, megalomaniac and 521 more...
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sort of sexy
pressure, press, urgency, squeezing, influence, compel, push, tease, thrust, full, drive, urge on and 99 more...
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National Library Agenda Summit
nla2006, summit, agenda, library, ala, diversity, education, learning, continuous, scan, environmental, plan and 646 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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Vocabulary Words
words to reference while writing something
cohesive, epitome, tempered, imply, prudent, sundry, sagest, agitation, giddy, disposition, inclination, gracious and 114 more...
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slumry's Words
cattywampus, ingratiate, lackadaisical, exactitude, exfoliate, fulminate, circumnavigation, circuitous, debride, sidle, sequester, chicory and 1002 more...
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colleen's words
yellow, green, pie, blue, fur, people, incense, book, brown, avuncular, mountain, fog and 1316 more...
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Words I have to learn
exasperate, felony, weld, fraud, worksheet, ransom, rehearse, preliminary, offshore, parole, infamous, sieve and 436 more...
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ff
attribute, sticking, distinct, perseverance, trend, clarify, avoidant, ambivalent, disoriented, cling, prompting, appositive and 94 more...
Tweets
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