enamor
EnglishEdit
Alternative formsEdit
EtymologyEdit
Old French enamourer, enamorer; prefix en- (Latin in) + Old French & French amour (“love”), Latin amor. See amour, and confer inamorato.
PronunciationEdit
VerbEdit
enamor (third-person singular simple present enamors, present participle enamoring, simple past and past participle enamored) (American spelling)
- (mostly in the passive, followed by "of" or "with") To cause to be in love.
- 1596, William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act IV, Scene I:
- Me-thought I was enamoured of an Asse.
- 1601, Ben Jonson, Poetaster or The Arraignment: […], London: […] [R. Bradock] for M[atthew] L[ownes] […], published 1602, OCLC 316392309, Act III, scene i:
- By Phœbus, here's a moſt neate fine ſtreete; is't not? I proteſt to thee, I am enamord of this ſtreete now, more then of halfe the ſtreetes of Rome, againe; tis ſo polite, and terſe; [...]
- 1900, Leo Tolstoy, translated by William E. Smith, The Awakening: The Resurrection Chapter 86
- He was offered a chair in the university and a course abroad. But he hesitated. There was a girl of whom he became enamored, so he contemplated marriage and political activity.
- (mostly in the passive) To captivate.
- 1824, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], Tales of a Traveller, (please specify |part=1 to 4), Philadelphia, Pa.: H[enry] C[harles] Carey & I[saac] Lea, […], OCLC 864083:
- Passionately enamoured of this shadow of a dream.
AntonymsEdit
TranslationsEdit
to inflame with love
See alsoEdit
ReferencesEdit
- enamor in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.