Library / English Dictionary

ROT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected forms: rotted    , rotting   

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Unacceptable behavior (especially ludicrously false statements)

Synonyms:

buncombe; bunk; bunkum; guff; hogwash; rot

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("rot" is a kind of...):

drivel; garbage (a worthless message)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "rot"):

bull; bullshit; crap; dogshit; horseshit; Irish bull; shit (obscene words for unacceptable behavior)

Sense 2

Meaning:

(biology) the process of decay caused by bacterial or fungal action

Synonyms:

breakdown; decomposition; putrefaction; rot; rotting

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural processes

Hypernyms ("rot" is a kind of...):

decay (the process of gradually becoming inferior)

Domain category:

biological science; biology (the science that studies living organisms)

Derivation:

rot (break down)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A state of decay usually accompanied by an offensive odor

Synonyms:

putrefaction; rot

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Hypernyms ("rot" is a kind of...):

decay (an inferior state resulting from the process of decaying)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "rot"):

corruption; putrescence; putridness; rottenness (in a state of progressive putrefaction)

Derivation:

rot (break down)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Become physically weaker

Example:

Political prisoners are wasting away in many prisons all over the world

Synonyms:

rot; waste

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

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

degenerate; deteriorate; devolve; drop (grow worse)

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

gangrene; mortify; necrose; sphacelate (undergo necrosis)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Sense 2

Meaning:

Break down

Example:

The bodies decomposed in the heat

Synonyms:

decompose; molder; moulder; rot

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

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

decay (undergo decay or decomposition)

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

biodegrade (break down naturally through the action of biological agents)

hang (suspend (meat) in order to get a gamey taste)

Sentence frames:

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

Derivation:

rot ((biology) the process of decay caused by bacterial or fungal action)

rot (a state of decay usually accompanied by an offensive odor)

rotting ((biology) the process of decay caused by bacterial or fungal action)

Credits

 Context examples: 

Another time they chanced upon the time-graven wreckage of a hunting lodge, and amid the shreds of rotted blankets John Thornton found a long-barrelled flint-lock.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

Deef I am, and dumb, as ye should be for the sake iv your mother; an’ never once have I opened me lips but to say fine things iv them an’ him, God curse his soul, an’ may he rot in purgatory ten thousand years, and then go down to the last an’ deepest hell iv all!

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

It is their ignorance, of course, that makes them believe such rot—their ignorance, which is nothing more nor less than the henidical mental process described by Weininger.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

But all these tokens of past grandeur were miserably decayed and dirty; rot, damp, and age, had weakened the flooring, which in many places was unsound and even unsafe.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Here a yellow stream flows from rotted moose-hide sacks and sinks into the ground, with long grasses growing through it and vegetable mould overrunning it and hiding its yellow from the sun; and here he muses for a time, howling once, long and mournfully, ere he departs.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

An' when you're dead, you'll rot the same as me, an' what's it matter how you live? —eh?

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Dry rot is no name for it.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

I shall leave masterpieces alone and do hack-work—jokes, paragraphs, feature articles, humorous verse, and society verse—all the rot for which there seems so much demand.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

She was such a beauty, in spirit as well as in appearance, and she was only slightly touched; yet she was doomed to lie there, living the life of a primitive savage and rotting slowly away.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Those potatoes are rotting.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)