lift

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“
The force of the lift is actually much stronger than the wind's force against the front side of the blade, which is called drag.

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Definitions (138)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (39)

  1. transitive verb To direct or carry from a lower to a higher position; raise: lift one's eyes; lifted the suitcase.
  2. transitive verb To transport by air: The helicopter lifted the entire team to the meet.
  3. transitive verb To revoke by taking back; rescind: lifted the embargo.
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Examples (50)

  • The station went down like a lift, and he waded waist-deep to the 23 companionway and climbed up to the next deck where Bodkin was exultantly watching the windows of the adjacent office blocks rise into the air. —  The Drowned World
  • He was giving the Inspector a lift, and had arranged to go down to the town to fetch him. —  Sweet Danger - Margery Allingham - Campion 05: 1933
  • He waved, and I waved, and, as this lift was a triple chair, he joined us and we settled in for a nice swing up the mountain. —  Isaac Asimov - Murder at the ABA
  • Sliding doors whistled back This lift was a private one, which Doc maintained for his own use. —  009 - The Czar of Fear
  • This lift was the product of his inventive genius, and operated at hair-lifting speed Stepping from the elevator, Doc entered his basement garage. —  014 - The Monsters
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Related

Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

elevator ·  load ·  twist ·  shake ·  sweep ·  move ·  thrust ·  swing ·  pressure ·  pull ·  nod ·  slide

Used in the same contextWord Family

lift:   lifted ·  lifting ·  lifts
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 (5)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English liften, from Old Norse lypta.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (4)

  1. from Middle English lift, luft, lyft, from Anglo-Saxon lyft = Old Saxon luft = Dutch lucht = Middle Low German lucht, luft, Low German luft = Old High German Middle High German G. luft = Icelandic lopt (pron. loft) = Danish Swedish luft = Gothic (Moesogothic) luftus, the air, the sky: the orig. Teutonic word for ‘air,’ and not found outside of Teutonic Hence, through Scandinavian, lift, loft, lofty, aloft, etc.
  2. from Middle English liften, lyften (preterit lift, lyft), from Icelandic lypta (pron. lyfta) (= Swedish lyfta = Danish löfte, lift, Middle High German G. lüften), lift, air, literally ‘raise in air,’ from lopt (pron. loft) = Swedish Danish luft = Middle High German G. luft = Anglo-Saxon lyft, lift, the air: see lift.
  3. from lift, v.
  4. Commonly supposed to be ult. akin to Gothic (Moesogothic) hlifan, steal (later hliftus, a thief), = Latin clepere = Greek κλέπ-τ-ειν (aorist passive κλαπη̄ναι), steal (see cleptomania, klepht). But the word is not found in this sense in Middle English or Anglo-Saxon, and this fact and the associations of the word make it clear that lift, remove, take away, steal, is simply a use of lift, raise: see lift.
 

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/lɪft/
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