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eat

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eat

  [eet] verb, ate [eyt; especially Brit. et] or (Archaic) eat [et, eet] ; eat⋅en or (Archaic) eat [et, eet] ; eat⋅ing; noun
Use eat in a Sentence
–verb (used with object)
1. to take into the mouth and swallow for nourishment; chew and swallow (food).
2. to consume by or as if by devouring gradually; wear away; corrode: The patient was eaten by disease and pain.
3. to make (a hole, passage, etc.), as by gnawing or corrosion.
4. to ravage or devastate: a forest eaten by fire.
5. to use up, esp. wastefully; consume (often fol. by up): Unexpected expenses have been eating up their savings.
6. to absorb or pay for: The builder had to eat the cost of the repairs.
7. Slang: Vulgar. to perform cunnilingus or fellatio on.
–verb (used without object)
8. to consume food; take a meal: We'll eat at six o'clock.
9. to make a way, as by gnawing or corrosion: Acid ate through the linoleum.
–noun
10. eats, Informal. food.
—Verb phrases
11. eat away or into, to destroy gradually, as by erosion: For eons, the pounding waves ate away at the shoreline.
12. eat out, to have a meal at a restaurant rather than at home.
13. eat up,
a. to consume wholly.
b. to show enthusiasm for; take pleasure in: The audience ate up everything he said.
c. to believe without question.
—Idioms
14. be eating someone, Informal. to worry, annoy, or bother: Something seems to be eating him—he's been wearing a frown all day.
15. eat crow. crow 1 (def. 7).
16. eat high off the hog. hog (def. 9).
17. eat humble pie. humble pie (def. 3).
18. eat in, to eat or dine at home.
19. eat one's heart out. heart (def. 24).
20. eat one's terms. term (def. 17).
21. eat one's words. word (def. 15).
22. eat out of one's hand. hand (def. 49).
23. eat someone out of house and home, to eat so much as to strain someone's resources of food or money: A group of hungry teenagers can eat you out of house and home.
24. eat someone's lunch, Slang. to thoroughly defeat, outdo, injure, etc.
25. eat the wind out of, Nautical. to blanket (a sailing vessel sailing close-hauled) by sailing close on the weather side of.
Origin:
bef. 900; ME eten, OE etan; c. G essen, Goth itan, L edere

Related forms:
eater, noun
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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eat   (ēt)   
v.   ate (āt), eat·en (ēt'n), eat·ing, eats

v.   tr.

    1. To take into the body by the mouth for digestion or absorption.

    2. To take in and absorb as food: a plant that eats insects; a cell that eats bacteria.

    3. To include habitually or by preference in one's diet: a bird that eats insects, fruit, and seeds; stopped eating red meat on advice from her doctor.

  2. To destroy, ravage, or use up by or as if by ingesting: "Covering news in the field eats money" (George F. Will).

  3. To erode or corrode: waves that ate away the beach; an acid that eats the surface of a machine part.

  4. To produce by or as if by eating: Moths ate holes in our sweaters.

  5. Slang To absorb the cost or expense of: "You can eat your loss and switch the remaining money to other investment portfolios" (Marlys Harris).

  6. Informal To bother or annoy: What's eating him?

  7. Vulgar Slang To perform cunnilingus on. Often used with out.

v.   intr.

    1. To consume food.

    2. To have or take a meal.

  2. To exercise a consuming or eroding effect: a drill that ate away at the rock; exorbitant expenses that were eating into profits.

  3. To cause persistent annoyance or distress: "How long will it be before the frustration eats at you?" (Howard Kaplan).

Phrasal Verb(s):
eat up Slang

  1. To receive or enjoy enthusiastically or avidly: She really eats up the publicity.

  2. To believe without question: He'll eat up whatever the broker tells him.


Idiom(s):
eat crowTo be forced to accept a humiliating defeat.

Idiom(s):
eat (one's) heart out

  1. To feel bitter anguish or grief.

  2. To be consumed by jealousy.


Idiom(s):
eat (one's) wordsTo retract something that one has said.

Idiom(s):
eat out of (someone's) handTo be manipulated or dominated by another.

Idiom(s):
eat (someone) alive Slang To overwhelm or defeat thoroughly: an inexperienced manager who was eaten alive in a competitive corporate environment.

[Middle English eten, from Old English etan; see ed- in Indo-European roots.]
eat'er n.
Synonyms: These verbs mean to take food into the body by the mouth: ate a hearty dinner; greedily consumed the sandwich; hyenas devouring their prey; whales ingesting krill.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Slang Dictionary
eat

  1. tv.
    [for something] to bother or worry someone. : Nothing's eating me. I'm just the nervous type.
  2. tv.
    to absorb the cost or expense of something. : We'll eat the costs on this one. It's the least we can do.
  3. tv.
    to perform oral sex on someone. (Usually objectionable.) : She said she wanted to eat me!
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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eat (one's)

  1. tv.
    to suffer from sorrow or grief. : Don't eat your heart out. You really didn't like him that much, did you?
  2. tv.
    to suffer from envy or jealousy. (Usually a command.) : Yeah, this one's all mine. Eat your heart out!
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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eat (sth)

  1. tv.
    to consume something rapidly, such as food or money. : Running this household eats my income up.
  2. tv.
    to believe something. : Those people really eat that stuff up about tax reduction.
  3. tv.
    to appreciate something. : The stuff about the federal budget went over well. They really ate up the whole story.
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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Word Origin & History

eat 
O.E. etan (class V strong verb; past tense æt, pp. eten), from P.Gmc. *etanan (cf. O.N. eta, Goth. itan, Ger. essen), from PIE base *ed- "to eat" (see edible). Transf. sense of "slow, gradual corrosion or destruction" is from 1555. Meaning "to preoccupy, engross" (as in what's eating you?) first recorded 1893. Slang sexual sense of "do cunnilingus on" is first recorded 1927. Eat out "dine away from home" is from 1933; eatery "restaurant" is from 1901; eats (n.) "food" is considered colloquial, but it was present in O.E. The slang phrase to eat one's words is from 1571; to eat one's heart out is from 1596; for eat one's hat, see hat.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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Medical Dictionary

Main Entry: eat
Pronunciation: 'Et
Function: verb
Inflected Form: ate /'At, chiefly Brit 'et/; eat·en /'Et-&n/; eat·ing
transitive senses
1 : to take in through the mouth as food : ingest, chew, and swallow in turn
2 : to consume gradually : CORRODE eat intransitive senses
: to take food ora meal
Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary, © 2002 Merriam-Webster, Inc.
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Medical Dictionary

eat (ēt)
v. ate (āt), eat·en (ēt'n), eat·ing, eats

  1. To take into the body by the mouth for digestion or absorption.

  2. To consume, ravage, or destroy by or as if by ingesting, such as by a disease.

The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
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Idioms & Phrases

eat

In addition to the idioms beginning with eat, also see dog eat dog; proof of the pudding is in the eating; what's eating you.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
Copyright © 1997. Published by Houghton Mifflin.
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Abbreviations & Acronyms
EAT

  1. earnings after taxes

  2. Tanzania (international vehicle ID)

The American Heritage® Abbreviations Dictionary, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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