Library / English Dictionary

BESTOW

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Present

Example:

bestow an honor on someone

Synonyms:

bestow; confer

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Hypernyms (to "bestow" is one way to...):

award; present (give, especially as an honor or reward)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "bestow"):

miter (confer a miter on (a bishop))

bless (confer prosperity or happiness on)

graduate (confer an academic degree upon)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something on somebody

Derivation:

bestowal; bestowment (the act of conferring an honor or presenting a gift)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Give as a gift

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Hypernyms (to "bestow" is one way to...):

give (transfer possession of something concrete or abstract to somebody)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something on somebody

Derivation:

bestowment (a gift that is bestowed or conferred)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Bestow a quality on

Example:

This adds a light note to the program

Synonyms:

add; bestow; bring; contribute; impart; lend

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Hypernyms (to "bestow" is one way to...):

alter; change; modify (cause to change; make different; cause a transformation)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "bestow"):

factor (be a contributing factor)

instill; transfuse (impart gradually)

tinsel (impart a cheap brightness to)

throw in (add as an extra or as a gratuity)

Sentence frames:

Something is ----ing PP
Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something
Somebody ----s something to somebody

Credits

 Context examples: 

It is much to do, and, oh, but there are rewards, in that we can bestow such happiness.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

“And,” added the other, “upon every aid which the wealth and power of Majorca can bestow.”

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

'The lock of hair, (repeating it from the letter,) which you so obligingly bestowed on me'—That is unpardonable.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

There for many years in a happy and peaceful old age lived Jack Harrison and his wife, receiving back in the sunset of their lives the loving care which they had themselves bestowed.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

So we proceeded without pausing to take breath, till the whole cargo was bestowed, when the two servants took up their position in the block house, and I, with all my power, sculled back to the HISPANIOLA.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

If by the aid of the powers which you are said to possess you can find such an envelope as I describe with its enclosure, you will have deserved well of your country, and earned any reward which it lies in our power to bestow.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

When the matron Houyhnhnms have produced one of each sex, they no longer accompany with their consorts, except they lose one of their issue by some casualty, which very seldom happens; but in such a case they meet again; or when the like accident befalls a person whose wife is past bearing, some other couple bestow on him one of their own colts, and then go together again until the mother is pregnant.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

I beg pardon—Ladies, Gentlemen, and Children—I must apologize, I had inadvertently omitted a considerable section of this audience (tumult, during which the Professor stood with one hand raised and his enormous head nodding sympathetically, as if he were bestowing a pontifical blessing upon the crowd), I have been selected to move a vote of thanks to Mr. Waldron for the very picturesque and imaginative address to which we have just listened.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

As with the running mate on the left, she repelled these attentions with her teeth; but when both bestowed their attentions at the same time she was roughly jostled, being compelled, with quick snaps to either side, to drive both lovers away and at the same time to maintain her forward leap with the pack and see the way of her feet before her.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Anne, satisfied at a very early period of Lady Russell's meaning to love Captain Wentworth as she ought, had no other alloy to the happiness of her prospects than what arose from the consciousness of having no relations to bestow on him which a man of sense could value.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)