Library / English Dictionary

GIRD

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected form: girt   

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Prepare oneself for a military confrontation

Example:

troops are building up on the Iraqi border

Synonyms:

arm; build up; fortify; gird

Classified under:

Verbs of fighting, athletic activities

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

re-arm; rearm (arm anew)

forearm (arm in advance of a confrontation)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sense 2

Meaning:

Bind with something round or circular

Synonyms:

encircle; gird

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

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

bind (make fast; tie or secure, with or as if with a rope)

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

hoop (bind or fasten with a hoop)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 3

Meaning:

Put a girdle on or around

Example:

gird your loins

Synonyms:

gird; girdle

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

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

border; environ; ring; skirt; surround (extend on all sides of simultaneously; encircle)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Credits

 Context examples: 

I dashed from my chair, threw my arms round Holmes, and together we lurched through the door, and an instant afterwards had thrown ourselves down upon the grass plot and were lying side by side, conscious only of the glorious sunshine which was bursting its way through the hellish cloud of terror which had girt us in.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Whoever performs his part with most agility, and holds out the longest in leaping and creeping, is rewarded with the blue-coloured silk; the red is given to the next, and the green to the third, which they all wear girt twice round about the middle; and you see few great persons about this court who are not adorned with one of these girdles.

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

In the presence of this old friend and of the tragedy which girt him round, the veil of triviality and affectation had been rent, and I felt all my gratitude towards him deepening for the first time into affection whilst I watched his pale, anxious face, and the eager hope which shone in his eyes as he awaited his friend’s explanation.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

At early dawn they passed across the broad, sluggish, reed-girt stream—men, horses, and baggage in the flat ferry barges—and so journeyed on through the fresh morning air past Exbury to Lepe.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Faced by an army, and girt in by fire, were six men and one woman; but some of them were men so trained to danger and so wise in war that even now the combat was less unequal than it seemed.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Then, coming forth from the woods, they laid siege to thy castle, and for two days they girt us in and shot hard against us, with such numbers as were a marvel to see.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Down in the courtyard half-clad wretches, their bare limbs all mottled with blood-stains, strutted about with plumed helmets upon their heads, or with the Lady Rochefort's silken gowns girt round their loins and trailing on the ground behind them.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In the meantime Sir Oliver had followed his brother knight, and the two paced the poop together, Sir Nigel in his plum-colored velvet suit with flat cap of the same, adorned in front with the Lady Loring's glove and girt round with a curling ostrich feather.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)