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SHORTENED
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
With parts removed
Example:
the drastically cut film
Synonyms:
cut; shortened
Classified under:
Similar:
abridged ((used of texts) shortened by condensing or rewriting)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Cut short
Example:
the shortened rope was easier to use
Synonyms:
sawed-off; sawn-off; shortened
Classified under:
Similar:
short ((primarily spatial sense) having little length or lacking in length)
Sense 3
Meaning:
Shortened by or as if by means of parts that slide one within another or are crushed one into another
Example:
years that seemed telescoped like time in a dream
Synonyms:
shortened; telescoped
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
short ((primarily spatial sense) having little length or lacking in length)
Sense 4
Meaning:
Cut short in duration
Example:
an unsatisfactory truncated conversation
Synonyms:
abbreviated; shortened; truncated
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
short (primarily temporal sense; indicating or being or seeming to be limited in duration)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
Past simple / past participle of the verb shorten
Context examples:
She took so kindly to me, that, in the course of a few weeks, she shortened my adopted name of Trotwood into Trot; and even encouraged me to hope, that if I went on as I had begun, I might take equal rank in her affections with my sister Betsey Trotwood.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
Clinical signs at birth include recurrent respiratory infections, poor feeding, hypotonia, joint laxity and characteristic shortened fifth digits with hypoplastic or absent nails and craniofacial appearance: microcephaly, wide nose and lips, sparse scalp hair but thick eyebrows and eyelashes.
(Coffin-Siris Syndrome, NCI Thesaurus)
A team led by Dr. Alejandro Hoberman at the University of Pittsburgh investigated whether a shortened course of antibiotics would work as well in young children as the standard 10-day treatment and reduce the risk of antibacterial resistance.
(No benefit to shortening ear infection treatment, NIH)
A combination of factors including the transition from the liver to the bone marrow for erythropoiesis in a neonate, blood loss experienced during delivery, the shortened life span of fetal blood cells, and an acclimation to a relatively hyperoxic environment outside the womb can predispose a neonate to this condition.
(Anemia of Prematurity, NCI Thesaurus)
Miss Bertram approved the decision, for the less he had to learn the better; and though she could not sympathise in his wish that the Count and Agatha might be to act together, nor wait very patiently while he was slowly turning over the leaves with the hope of still discovering such a scene, she very kindly took his part in hand, and curtailed every speech that admitted being shortened; besides pointing out the necessity of his being very much dressed, and chusing his colours.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
In the meanwhile also the black ground was covered with herbage, and the green banks interspersed with innumerable flowers, sweet to the scent and the eyes, stars of pale radiance among the moonlight woods; the sun became warmer, the nights clear and balmy; and my nocturnal rambles were an extreme pleasure to me, although they were considerably shortened by the late setting and early rising of the sun, for I never ventured abroad during daylight, fearful of meeting with the same treatment I had formerly endured in the first village which I entered.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
As every person called up made exactly the same appearance he had done in the world, it gave me melancholy reflections to observe how much the race of human kind was degenerated among us within these hundred years past; how the pox, under all its consequences and denominations had altered every lineament of an English countenance; shortened the size of bodies, unbraced the nerves, relaxed the sinews and muscles, introduced a sallow complexion, and rendered the flesh loose and rancid.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
I felt glad as the road shortened before me: so glad that I stopped once to ask myself what that joy meant: and to remind reason that it was not to my home I was going, or to a permanent resting-place, or to a place where fond friends looked out for me and waited my arrival.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
