Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To be obliged or required by morality, law, or custom: Citizens must register in order to vote.
- v. To be compelled, as by a physical necessity or requirement: Plants must have oxygen in order to live.
- v. Used to express a command or admonition: You must not go there alone. You simply must be careful.
- v. To be determined to; have as a fixed resolve: If you must leave, do it quietly.
- v. Used to indicate inevitability or certainty: We all must die.
- v. Used to indicate logical probability or presumptive certainty: If the lights were on, they must have been at home.
- v. Archaic To be required or obliged to go: "I must from hence” ( Shakespeare).
- n. Something that is absolutely required or indispensable: Promptness on the job is a must. Comfortable boots are a must when going on a hike.
- n. The quality or condition of being stale or musty.
- n. The unfermented or fermenting juice expressed from fruit, especially grapes.
- n. Variant of musth.
- n. Musk.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To be obliged; be necessarily compelled; be bound or required by physical or moral necessity, or by express command or prohibition, or by the imperative requirements of safety or interest; be necessary or inevitable as a condition or conclusion: as, a man must eat to live; we must obey the laws; you must not delay. Like other auxiliaries, must was formerly used without a following verb (go, get, and the like): as, we must to horse.
- n. New wine; the unfermented juice as pressed from the grape.
- n. . The stage or condition of newness: said of wine.
- n. The pulp of potatoes prepared for fermentation.
- n. A condition of strong nervous excitement or frenzy to which elephants are subject, the paroxysms being marked by dangerous irascibility.
- To grow stale and moldy; contract a sour or musty smell.
- To make stale and moldy; make musty or sour.
- n. Mold or moldiness; fustiness.
- Frenzied; in the state of madness known as must: as, a must elephant.
Wiktionary
- n. Something that exhibits the property of being stale or musty
- n. Fruit juice that will ferment or has fermented, usually grapes
- v. transitive To make musty.
- v. intransitive To become musty.
- n. A time during which male elephants exhibit increased levels of sexual activity and aggressiveness (also musth)
- v. modal auxiliary, defective to do with certainty; indicates that the speaker is certain that the subject will have executed the predicate
- v. modal auxiliary, defective to do as a requirement; indicates that the sentence subject is required as an imperative or directive to execute the sentence predicate, with failure to do so resulting in a negative consequence
- n. Something that is mandatory or required
GNU Webster's 1913
- To be obliged; to be necessitated; -- expressing either physical or moral necessity
- To be morally required; to be necessary or essential to a certain quality, character, end, or result
- n. The expressed juice of the grape, or other fruit, before fermentation.
- n. Mustiness.
- v. To make musty; to become musty.
- adj. (Zoöl.) Being in a condition of dangerous frenzy, usually connected with sexual excitement; -- said of adult male elephants which become so at irregular intervals, typicaly due to increased testosterone levels.
WordNet 3.0
- n. grape juice before or during fermentation
- adj. highly recommended
- n. the quality of smelling or tasting old or stale or mouldy
- n. a necessary or essential thing
Etymologies
- From Middle English moste ("must", literally "had to"), from Old English mōste ("had to"), 1st & 3rd person singular past tense of mōtan ("to be allowed, be able to, have the opportunity to, be compelled to, must, may"). Cognate with Dutch moest ("had to"), German musste ("had to"), Swedish måste ("must, have to, be obliged to"). More at mote. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English moste, from Old English mōste, past tense of mōtan, to be allowed; see med- in Indo-European roots.Probably back-formation from musty.Middle English, from Old English, from Latin mustum, from neuter of mustus, new, fresh.Scottish, from Old French, variant of musc; see musk. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“August 1, 2009 at 1:36 pm must resist……………..must………….resist.”
Houston, - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger?
“I must say, though, that most everyone around here is looking at me like we *must* be since I quit my job, all our friends are preggers or have babies and it's been two years of marriage...”
“You thunk it so it must be…….must be…..must be…WHAT?”
Think Progress » Limbaugh on Michael J. Fox: ‘I Take Back None of What I Said’
“ I recalled Speaker Weatherill's advice to the Select Committee on Members 'Interests that 'a Member must be vigilant that his actions do not tend to bring the House into disrepute' and, in particular, that Members who hold financial consultancies must not use their position improperly.”
“Mike figured that Keku must -- absolutely _must_ -- have the king of hearts.”
“Any attempt to stop the process of incubation, after the contagion has once been received within the body, or to prevent its being thrown out upon the surface, would destroy the patient's life: the morbid poison must be concocted, and it _must come away by being drawn to the skin as soon as possible_, to prevent its settling in the vital parts, and injuring them.”
“The present Parliament, however called together, must consider itself the only legitimate, the only constitutional power: it _must_ look into this instrument of government.”
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847
“But he must come back, he _must_ come back, her heart cried over and over again.”
“We must warn Tom -- oh, we _must_ warn him somehow!" she gasped.”
“You must have God with you behind the counter of your shop, or your office, and if God is to be there you _must speak_ the truth.”
The Life of Duty, v. 2 A year's plain sermons on the Gospels or Epistles
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘must’.
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Public List: Two by Fives
This is an experiment in public lists--something I've been thinking about for some time. The goal is to create a collection of short, powerful, evocative words.
This is an open list. A...icy, howl, hymn, thorn, fire, vile, mist, blunt, scum, dark, shot, gleam and 221 more...
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EN - Glasgow stop list
Words to be replaced by a paragraph mark if you are after terms and MWEs.
yours, yourself, yet, your, without, you, within, will, yourselves, would, why, with and 291 more...
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Grapes
sour grapes, grape, grapes, raisin, Nehi grape soda, Petit Verdot, Concord, Pinot Meunier, scuppernong, muscadine, Catawba, seedless and 112 more...
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POL - campaign tokenisms
Positive words and vague promises. THE words and expressions to use when you want to win over the masses or just don't know what to say.
"CAPITAL" stands for the administrative capital...grow, greatest country, greatest, grow the economy, great nation, great decisions, great, government, great NATIONAL su..., good times, good job, good and generous... and 751 more...
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Wort to the wise
Brewing terms
wort, gruit, metheglin, mead, perry, mulsum, finings, irish moss, malt, hops, morat, melomel and 43 more...
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Evocative smells
They remind me of a particular time, place, or activity
cigar smoke, apples, tea roses, wild roses, lysol, shoe polish, linseed oil, school house, coal dust, mock orange, chlorine, violets and 116 more...
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
a, abandon, ability, able, abortion, about, above, abroad, absence, absolute, absolutely, absorb and 4334 more...
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fbharjo's Words
jumelle, kef, kenspeckle, lautitious, essentic, pilpulistic, impavid, cicurant, clou, chrysostomic, miasma, teleology and 1625 more...
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US - national anthem vocabulary
All words and phrases (except the most common articles and prepositions)
For a word frequency analysis see:
air, band, banner, battle, battle's~confusion, beam, blest, blood, blow, bomb, brave, breeze and 174 more... -
another yet
anneal, copepod, cuckoo, fathead, intone, patter, cabriole, knickknack, boodle, kit, estrange, forebode and 209 more...
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the hotlist
short, sweet, epic, catchy, sassy, sexy & sizzling.
( personal list, randomness )
more:
http://www.wordnik.com/lists/...zing, epic, win, fail, hot, warp, times, clip, onyx, wonky, pwn, leet and 1493 more...
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Boosting Words
Boosters in academic language, from Ken Hyland in Appendix 3 of Disciplinary Discourses (2000; Harlow, Essex:
Pearson)we know, we think, actually, always, apparent, beyond doubt, certain that, certainly, certainty, clearly, conclusively, decidedly and 30 more...
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Defective
beware, can, may, methinks, must, ought, shall, quoth, will, wis, wit
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OM3 Lesson 32
donuts, doughnuts, used, dozen, dozens, variety, carpool, gasoline, gas, gallon, million, a day and 38 more...
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Stench
Smelly words
putrefaction, putrid, fetid, fetor, rancid, rank, noxious, acrid, pungent, piquant, stench, mildew and 18 more...
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quirks of grammar
Particularly interesting grammatical quirks.
Yes, I said interesting. Who are you looking at so strangely?likely, must, rumoured, stride, there's, try, word, bush, hamstring, let's, 's, sheep and 4 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for must.

qroqqa Quirk of grammar (of the auxiliary verb): it lacks a past tense. Jan 9, 2009
fbharjo must in the sense of being new wine Dec 27, 2006