Library / English Dictionary

STARVE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Die of food deprivation

Example:

Many famished in the countryside during the drought

Synonyms:

famish; starve

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

buy the farm; cash in one's chips; choke; conk; croak; decease; die; drop dead; exit; expire; give-up the ghost; go; kick the bucket; pass; pass away; perish; pop off; snuff it (pass from physical life and lose all bodily attributes and functions necessary to sustain life)

Sentence frames:

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

Sense 2

Meaning:

Deprive of food

Example:

They starved the prisoners

Synonyms:

famish; starve

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

deprive (keep from having, keeping, or obtaining)

Cause:

famish; hunger; starve (be hungry; go without food)

Verb group:

starve (deprive of a necessity and cause suffering)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Antonym:

feed (give food to)

Derivation:

starvation; starving (the act of depriving of food or subjecting to famine)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Deprive of a necessity and cause suffering

Example:

The engine was starved of fuel

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

deprive (keep from having, keeping, or obtaining)

Verb group:

famish; starve (deprive of food)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody

Sense 4

Meaning:

Be hungry; go without food

Example:

Let's eat--I'm starving!

Synonyms:

famish; hunger; starve

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

hurt; suffer (feel pain or be in pain)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Antonym:

be full (be sated, have enough to eat)

Derivation:

starvation (a state of extreme hunger resulting from lack of essential nutrients over a prolonged period)

Sense 5

Meaning:

Have a craving, appetite, or great desire for

Synonyms:

crave; hunger; lust; starve; thirst

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

desire; want (feel or have a desire for; want strongly)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Credits

 Context examples: 

Lord Roxton had had nothing but some fruit since the morning before and ate like a starving man.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Starved and tired enough he was: but he looked happier than when he set out.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

If humanity had been wiped out, the gods would have starved.

(‘Trickster god’ used fake news in Babylonian Noah story, University of Cambridge)

When light and electric fields were blocked, starved worms burrowed down, while well-fed worms migrated up.

(Magnetic Field Sensor Unearthed in Worms, NIH)

The grasslands the animals depend on for food dried up and watering holes disappeared, leaving many animals starving or weak from hunger.

(Born during a drought: Bad news for baboons, NSF)

"I should like something to eat besides fruit," said the girl, "and I'm sure Toto is nearly starved. Let us stop at the next house and talk to the people."

(The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum)

The question now is whether we should take a premature lunch here, or run our chance of starving before we reach the buffet at Newhaven.

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

But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

Continued eutrophication essentially kills a lake, with an overgrowth of algae starving its waters of oxygen and leaving fish and other freshwater species unable to breathe.

(Ancient lakes: eyes into the past, and the future, National Science Foundation)

She was pretty and soft, but she weighed one hundred and twenty pounds—a lusty last straw to the load dragged by the weak and starving animals.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)