Library / English Dictionary

DEVOUR

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Eat greedily

Example:

he devoured three sandwiches

Synonyms:

devour; guttle; pig; raven

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

eat (take in solid food)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sentence example:

They devour more bread

Sense 2

Meaning:

Eat up completely, as with great appetite

Example:

The teenagers demolished four pizzas among them

Synonyms:

consume; demolish; devour; down; go through

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

eat up; finish; polish off (finish eating all the food on one's plate or on the table)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s somebody

Sentence example:

They devour more bread

Derivation:

devourer (someone who eats greedily or voraciously)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Destroy completely

Example:

Fire had devoured our home

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

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

destroy; ruin (destroy completely; damage irreparably)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s something

Sense 4

Meaning:

Enjoy avidly

Example:

She devoured his novels

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

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

bask; enjoy; relish; savor; savour (derive or receive pleasure from; get enjoyment from; take pleasure in)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Credits

 Context examples: 

He had put his pack down as a table, and the two of them were devouring a great pasty, and washing it down with some drink from a stone jar.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

My revenge is of no moment to you; yet, while I allow it to be a vice, I confess that it is the devouring and only passion of my soul.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Without enough sharks, the grazers could devour the underwater grass beds, Michael Heithaus of Florida International University (FIU) has found.

(Sharks, the seagrass protectors, National Science Foundation)

Creatures which were supposed to be Jurassic, monsters who would hunt down and devour our largest and fiercest mammals, still exist. (Cries of Bosh! Prove it! How do YOU know? Question!)

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Space is filled with radiation from nearby stars as well as from violent events in deep space like exploding stars and black holes devouring matter.

(Vitamin B3 might have been made in space, delivered to Earth by meteorites, NASA)

That’s important because refrigeration and air conditioning currently devour a fifth of the energy produced worldwide, and demand for cooling is only going up.

(Green material for refrigeration identified, University of Cambridge)

He ran out and ran in, smoked incessantly, played snatches on his violin, sank into reveries, devoured sandwiches at irregular hours, and hardly answered the casual questions which I put to him.

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

There is no competition for the prize: the honey-hunters harvest the honey and honeyguides devour the wax combs left behind.

(How humans and wild Honeyguide birds call each other to help, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

I watched him into the heart of Mr. Micawber's letter, and returned the elevation of eyebrows with which he said ““Wielding the thunderbolt, or directing the devouring and avenging flame!”

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

They yelped and howled under the rain of blows, but struggled none the less madly till the last crumb had been devoured.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)