surround
EnglishEdit
EtymologyEdit
From Middle English sourrounden (“to submerge, overflow”), from Middle French souronder, suronder, from Late Latin superundō, from super + undō (“to rise in waves”), from unda (“wave”).
PronunciationEdit
VerbEdit
surround (third-person singular simple present surrounds, present participle surrounding, simple past and past participle surrounded)
- (transitive) To encircle something or simultaneously extend in all directions.
- 1944, Miles Burton, chapter 5, in The Three Corpse Trick:
- The hovel stood in the centre of what had once been a vegetable garden, but was now a patch of rank weeds. Surrounding this, almost like a zareba, was an irregular ring of gorse and brambles, an unclaimed vestige of the original common.
- 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 3, in The China Governess[1]:
- Sepia Delft tiles surrounded the fireplace, their crudely drawn Biblical scenes in faded cyclamen blending with the pinkish pine, while above them, instead of a mantelshelf, there was an archway high enough to form a balcony with slender balusters and a tapestry-hung wall behind.
- 2005, Plato, Sophist. Translation by Lesley Brown. 230c.
- and this way they get rid of those grand and stubborn opinions that surround them.
- (transitive) To enclose or confine something on all sides so as to prevent escape.
- (transitive, obsolete) To pass around; to travel about; to circumnavigate.
- to surround the world
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Fuller to this entry?)
SynonymsEdit
TranslationsEdit
surround, fence in — see enclose
to encircle something or simultaneously extend in all directions
to enclose to prevent escape
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Translations to be checked
NounEdit
surround (plural surrounds)
- (Britain) Anything, such as a fence or border, that surrounds something.
- 1972, Frederick Forsyth, The Odessa File, Viking, SBN 670-52042-x, chapter 15, page 283:
- He drifted through the room, avoiding the furniture by instinct, closed the door that led to the passage, and only then flicked on his flashlight.
- It swept around the room, picking out a desk, a telephone, a wall of bookshelves, and a deep armchair, and finally settled on a handsome fireplace with a large surround of red brick.
- 1972, Frederick Forsyth, The Odessa File, Viking, SBN 670-52042-x, chapter 15, page 283: