short|en

short|en
short|en «SHR tuhn», transitive verb.
1. to make shorter; cut off: »

to shorten the working day. The new highway shortens the trip. She has had all her dresses shortened. Envy and wrath shorten the life (Ecclesiasticus 30:24).

2. to make seem shorter: »

Thus were the hours of labour shortened…by shrewd remarks and bits of local gossip (Joseph Conrad).

3. to make rich, as with butter or lard; add shortening to: »

She used butter to shorten her cakes.

4. to lessen the area of (a vessel's sails) by reefing or furling; take in (sail).
5. (in the Bible) to reduce the reach or power of: »

Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save (Isaiah 59:1).

6. to treat or pronounce (a vowel or syllable) as short.
–v.i.
1. to become shorter; dwindle in size: »

The days shorten in November in this country.

2. (of odds or prices) to decrease.
short´en|er, noun.
Synonym Study transitive verb. 1 Shorten, curtail, abbreviate mean to make shorter. Shorten is the general word meaning to reduce the length or extent of something: »

The new highway shortens the trip.

Curtail, more formal, means to cut something short by taking away or cutting off a part, and suggests causing loss or incompletenes: »

Bad news made us curtail our trip.

Abbreviate most commonly means to shorten the written form of a word or phrase by leaving out syllables or letters or by substitution, without impairing meaning: »

Abbreviate “pound” to “lb.” after numerals.

Abbreviate may also be used more generally, closer in meaning to shorten than to curtail.

Useful english dictionary. 2012.

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Look at other dictionaries:

  • Short — Short, a. [Compar. {Shorter}; superl. {Shortest}.] [OE. short, schort, AS. scort, sceort; akin to OHG. scurz, Icel. skorta to be short of, to lack, and perhaps to E. shear, v. t. Cf. {Shirt}.] 1. Not long; having brief length or linear extension; …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • short — [shôrt] adj. [ME < OE scort, akin to ON skort, short piece of clothing, OHG scurz, short < IE * (s)kerd < base * (s)ker , to cut, SHEAR < CURT] 1. not extending far from end to end; not long or not long enough 2. not great in span,… …   English World dictionary

  • short — [ ʃɔrt ] n. m. • 1910; angl. shorts, de short « court » ♦ Culotte courte (pour le sport, les vacances). Short de tennis. Être en short. ⇒aussi bermuda, boxer short, flottant. Des shorts. Loc. fam. Tailler un short à qqn, le frôler (en voiture). ● …   Encyclopédie Universelle

  • short — ► ADJECTIVE 1) of a small length or duration. 2) relatively small in extent. 3) (of a person) small in height. 4) (short of/on) not having enough of. 5) in insufficient supply. 6) (of a person) terse; uncivil. 7) …   English terms dictionary

  • Short — bezeichnet Short Brothers (Flugzeughersteller), ein ehemaliger britischer Flugzeughersteller Short Brothers (Werft), eine ehemaliger britische Werft in der Mathematik als Short Format einen Begriff der Gleitkommaarithmetik, siehe IEEE 754 FP… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • short — 1 adj 1: treated or disposed of quickly in court the calendar for short causes 2 a: not having goods or property that one has sold in anticipation of a fall in prices a seller who was short at the time of the sale b: consisting of or relating to… …   Law dictionary

  • Short S.23 — Saltar a navegación, búsqueda S.23 Short Clase C de Qantas, 1940 Tipo Hidrocanoa de correo y pasaje Fabricante …   Wikipedia Español

  • short — short; short·age; short·en; short·en·er; short·ish; short·ite; short·ly; short·ness; short·om·e·ter; short·schat; short·sight·ed·ness; short·some; ul·tra·short; short·hand·ed·ness; short·shat; short·sight·ed·ly; …   English syllables

  • Short S.C.1 — Short S.C.1 …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • short — [adj1] abridged abbreviate, abbreviated, aphoristic, bare, boiled down, breviloquent, brief, compendiary, compendious, compressed, concise, condensed, curtailed, curtate, cut short, cut to the bone*, decreased, decurtate, diminished, epigrammatic …   New thesaurus

  • Short — may refer to: * Short (surname) * Holly Short, a fictional character from the Artemis Fowl series * Short circuit, an accidental connection between two nodes of an electrical circuit * Short (finance), stock trading status * Short film, a cinema… …   Wikipedia

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