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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. v. To get back; regain.
  2. v. To rescue or save.
  3. v. Sports To make a difficult but successful return of (a ball or shuttlecock, as in tennis or badminton).
  4. v. To bring back again; revive or restore.
  5. v. To rectify the unfavorable consequences of; remedy. See Synonyms at recover.
  6. v. To recall to mind; remember.
  7. v. To find and carry back; fetch.
  8. v. To find and bring back game: a dog trained to retrieve.
  9. n. The act of retrieving; retrieval.
  10. n. Sports A difficult but successful return of a ball or shuttlecock.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. To find again; discover again; recover; regain.
  2. Specifically, in hunting, to search for and fetch: as, a dog retrieves killed or wounded birds or other game to the sportsman.
  3. To bring back to a state of well-being, prosperity, or success; restore; reëstablish: as, to retrieve one's credit.
  4. To make amends for; repair; better; ameliorate.
  5. To find, recover, or restore anything; specifically, in sporting, to seek and bring killed or wounded game: as, the dog retrieves well.
  6. n. A seeking again; a discovery; a recovery; specifically, in hunting, the recovery of game once sprung.

Wiktionary

  1. v. To regain or get back something.
  2. v. To rescue (a) creature(s)
  3. v. To salvage something
  4. v. To remedy or rectify something.
  5. v. To remember or recall something.
  6. v. To fetch or carry back something.
  7. v. To fetch and bring in game.
  8. v. To fetch and bring in game systematically.
  9. v. To fetch or carry back systematically, notably as a game.
  10. v. To make a difficult but successful return of the ball.
  11. n. A retrieval
  12. n. The return of a difficult ball

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. v. To find again; to recover; to regain; to restore from loss or injury.
  2. v. To recall; to bring back.
  3. v. To remedy the evil consequence of, to repair, as a loss or damadge.
  4. v. To discover and bring in game that has been killed or wounded.
  5. n. A seeking again; a discovery.
  6. n. The recovery of game once sprung; -- an old sporting term.

WordNet 3.0

  1. v. get or find back; recover the use of
  2. v. go for and bring back
  3. v. recall knowledge from memory; have a recollection
  4. v. run after, pick up, and bring to the master

Etymologies

  1. Middle English retreven, from Old French retrover, retruev- : re-, re- + trover, to find; see trover.

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‘retrieve’ has been looked up 1567 times, loved by 1 person, added to 14 lists, and has a Scrabble score of 11.