perish

Contents

English

Etymology

From Middle English perishen, from Old French periss-, stem of certain parts of perir, from Latin perīre (“to pass away, perish”), present active infinitive of pereō, from per (“through”) + eō (“to go”); see iter.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɛɹɪʃ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Homophone: parish (some accents)
• Hyphenation: per‧ish

Verb

perish (third-person singular simple present perishes, present participle perishing, simple past and past participle perished)

1. (intransitive) To decay and disappear; to waste away to nothing.
   • 1881, Tarafa, translated by W. A. Clouston, The Poem of Tarafa

     I consider time as a treasure decreasing every night; and that which every day diminishes soon perishes for ever.

2. (intransitive) To decay in such a way that it can't be used for its original purpose
   • 2015, Christopher Cumo, Foods that Changed History

     The difficulty is that fresh foods perish due to the multiplication in them of harmful bacteria.

3. (intransitive) To die; to cease to live.
   • 1719, Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe

     ...the ship struck upon a sand, and ... the sea broke over her in such a manner that we expected we should all have perished immediately; and we were immediately driven into our close quarters, to shelter us from the very foam and spray of the sea.

4. (transitive, obsolete) To cause to perish.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Francis Bacon to this entry?)

Synonyms

• decease, pass away
• See also Thesaurus:die

Derived terms

• perish the thought

Related terms

• perishable

Translations

pass away

• Aromanian: cher
• Catalan: perir (ca)
• Dutch: vergaan (nl), bederven (nl)
• Esperanto: perei (eo)
• Finnish: menehtyä (fi)
• French: périr (fr)
• Friulian: perî
• German: verderben (de), schlecht werden (food)
• Greek:

  Ancient: φθείρομαι (phtheíromai)

• Indonesian: binasa (id), musnah (id)
• Irish:

  Old Irish: ara·chrin

• Italian: perire (it)
• Korean: 죽다 (ko) (jukda), 비명횡사하다 (bimyeonghoengsahada)
• Latgalian: gaist
• Latin: pereō, perbitō
• Latvian: zust
• Lithuanian: žūti
• Malay: musnah
• Maori: tipoko
• Portuguese: perecer (pt)
• Quechua: wañuy
• Romanian: pieri (ro)
• Russian: поги́бнуть (ru) pf (pogíbnutʹ)
• Sanskrit: नश्यति (sa) (naśyati)
• Spanish: perecer (es)

die

• Dutch: omkomen (nl), sterven (nl), vergaan (nl)
• Esperanto: perei (eo)
• Finnish: menehtyä (fi)
• French: périr (fr)
• German: umkommen (de), ums Leben kommen (de), verenden (de)(animals), verderben (de) (archaic)
• Greek:

  Ancient: φθείρομαι (phtheíromai)

• Irish:

  Old Irish: ara·chrin

• Korean: 죽다 (ko) (jukda)
• Latin: pereō
• Mongolian: үхэх (mn) (üheh)
• Plautdietsch: omkomen
• Polish: zginąć (pl)
• Sanskrit: नश्यति (sa) (naśyati)
• Spanish: perecer (es)
• Swahili: kuangamia

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Catalan: perir (ca)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 殞 (zh), 殒 (zh) (yǔn), 死亡 (zh) (sǐwáng), 死 (zh) (sǐ)

• Cornish: merwel
• Czech: zaniknout, zahynout
• Dutch: wegkwijnen (nl)
• French: périr (fr)
• Italian: perire (it)

• Japanese: 亡びる (ほろびる, horobiru), 滅びる (ja) (ほろびる, horobiru), 死ぬ (ja) (しぬ, shinu)
• Korean: 멸망하다 (ko) (myeolmang-hada)
• Old English: forweorþan
• Romanian: pieri (ro)
• Russian: погиба́ть (ru) impf (pogibátʹ), пасть (ru) pf (pastʹ), умира́ть (ru) impf (umirátʹ), умере́ть (ru) pf (umerétʹ), сги́нуть (ru) pf (sgínutʹ)
• Vietnamese: diệt vong (vi)
• Welsh: aballu (cy)

Further reading

• perish in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• perish in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911

Anagrams

• hipers, pisher, reship, seriph