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torn

[tawrn, tohrn]

Example Sentences Origin

verb

past participle of tear².

Related forms

un·torn, adjective

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Torn is one of our favorite verbs.

So is lollygag. Does it mean:

to swindle, cheat, hoodwink, or hoax.

to spend time idly; loaf.

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Example Sentences

Familiar stores are gone, and many public buildings have been torn down and rebuilt.

One disadvantage of water spouts is that they can be torn apart by the wind.

Iceland is regularly stretched, split, and torn by violent earthquakes and haphazardly rebuilt by exploding volcanoes.

EXPAND

Familiar stores are gone, and many public buildings have been torn down and rebuilt.

One disadvantage of water spouts is that they can be torn apart by the wind.

Iceland is regularly stretched, split, and torn by violent earthquakes and haphazardly rebuilt by exploding volcanoes.

Many dams are being torn down these days, allowing rivers and the ecosystems they support to rebound.

But his ribs were bruised, and the muscle was torn from his rib cage.

What could be better on a summer night than a simple pasta studded with juicy, fresh garden tomatoes, freshly torn basil.

Suddenly you're torn out of your suspension of disbelief by a character, mounting up for a.

But high-quality clothes are conspicuous, even when they are dirty and torn.

Across the city, thoroughfares have been torn up to make way for new bus lanes and terminals.

Many buildings were destroyed because they straddled the fault and were torn apart.

Torn tendons, muscles and ligaments plague athletes in many types of sports.

Rectangular holes in the tail show where the fabric coverings were torn away.

The announcement represented four years of soul-searching by an air service torn between today's fights and tomorrow's.

It can be tacked to a corkboard, torn to shreds, or shown to friends.

Thailand has torn up a joint maritime oil-exploration treaty.

All vegetation was torn away, leaving mud and red dirt exposed.

And it is understandable why a building which has experienced unusual horror and violence to be torn down.

Greenlanders themselves seem torn about climate change.

The posters can be torn out of the book and plastered somewhere useful.

It probably outlined the piece of torn cartilage that was laying in the spot it was torn from.

When it was a torn lump of flesh they tossed it to their dogs.

Each one is a loss to humanity, a loss to a local community, and a hole torn in the ecology of our planet".

Many families have similarly been torn apart in the continuing aftermath of the earthquake, tsunami and meltdowns.

Warnecke doesn't want the termite's plumbing to get torn and its contents mixed around.

The right wing was torn completely away and tumbled end-over-end in a brilliant exploding.

The burned-out shell was torn down to the foundations, and the contractors started over.

Syrians seemed torn between their agony at the former ruler's death and their elation at the new one's accession.

From our planet's infancy the atoms that make it up have held together, even as continents have been torn apart and rearranged.

The article was unfortunately in a torn magazine and he couldn't find out its ending.

New bridges run across canyons and streams that were once boundaries for turf wars, linking neighborhoods once torn apart.

Pretty nifty tool if you're really torn between the two giants.

The imprisoned dissidents beaten to death in holding pens, some with their fingernails torn out.

Eventually everyone will be in new apartments, but their old ones will be torn down and rebuilt.

My leg was crushed and some of the calf muscle was torn off.

The ground dug up for the old building will be use to fill in the hole created when the old building is torn down.

Just a torn copy of the sales pitch crumpled in a corner.

Three of her exterior gondolas were torn away, and the airship broke in two.

Paper clips fall off, torn and folded corners don't work.

So he had it torn down and its supervisors executed.

Four hospitals in the city were seriously damaged by the storm, and the roof was torn off a nursing home, she said.

It takes the atomic material that is being torn apart and sheds it revealing an as yet effected molecule.

His eyes harden as he sees that the duiker had almost torn off a front leg trying to free itself from the trap.

Sure, you can suspend a bridge with metal rods and mend your torn clothes with staples.

It will be hard because you will be torn up inside but it will help in her adjustment.

Babies torn from their mothers' arms-to be smashed against walls, he learned later.

Some manuscripts have yellowing, torn pages with notes scrawled around the margins.

People with old spinal cord injuries have torn and detached tissues that have been encapsulated by scar tissue.

My brother had a dog that came up all torn up in the past three months.

Prefab construction tends to conjure up visions of mobile homes being torn apart by hurricanes.

The criminal justice folks wear jeans and torn tee shirts.

Another thing to note is that almost every single shoe of mine that has torn has torn around my toes.

The water meant the feet got torn up and blistered even more than usual.

The chiropractic profession is torn by these new proposals with some for and others strongly against these changes.

It's then back to the lab, where the vehicle gets torn apart, repaired and rebuilt.

Only someone completely torn away from reality could argue that.

He also has some good advice on how to repair your partnership after it has been torn apart by money and fame.

You'll be taught how to pump out the bilge and repair torn sails.

Since then, the forint has see-sawed and monetary policy has looked confused, torn between its conflicting objectives.

The entire team is now really torn between the desire to complete the experiment and the fear of losing a shark in the process.

Perhaps the book was bound to be flawed, given the pace with which today's crisis has torn through the markets.

Hundreds of men with sun-soaked brown faces scuttled past in tank tops, baggy slacks, and torn flip-flops.

One goal is to prevent older houses from being torn down.

COLLAPSE

Dictionary.com Unabridged

noun

a drop of the saline, watery fluid continually secreted by the lacrimal glands between the surface of the eye and the eyelid, serving to moisten and lubricate these parts and keep them clear of foreign particles. Synonyms: teardrop.

this fluid appearing in or flowing from the eye as the result of emotion, especially grief: to shed tears.

something resembling or suggesting a tear, as a drop of a liquid or a tearlike mass of a solid substance, especially having a spherical or globular shape at one end and tapering to a point at the other: teardrop earrings.

Glassmaking. a decorative air bubble enclosed in a glass vessel; air bell.

tears, grief; sorrow.

verb (used without object)

to fill up and overflow with tears, as the eyes (often followed by up): My eyes were tearing in the wind. He teared up when he heard the news.

Idiom

in tears, weeping: He was in tears over the death of his dog.

Origin:
before 900; (noun) Middle English teer, Old English tēar, tehher, taeher; cognate with Old High German zahar, Old Norse tār, Gothic tagr, Greek dákry, Latin lacrima (see lachrymal); (v.) Middle English teren, Old English teheran, in teherende (gerund), derivative of the noun

verb (used with object)

to pull apart or in pieces by force, especially so as to leave ragged or irregular edges. Synonyms: rend, rip, rive. Antonyms: mend, repair, sew.

to pull or snatch violently; wrench away with force: to tear wrappings from a package; to tear a book from someone's hands.

to distress greatly: anguish that tears the heart. Synonyms: break, crack, shatter, afflict.

to divide or disrupt: a country torn by civil war. Synonyms: disunite, split, splinter. Antonyms: unite, reunite, join, bind.

to wound or injure by or as if by rending; lacerate. Synonyms: cut, mangle, slash.

EXPAND

to produce or effect by rending: to tear a hole in one's coat.

to remove by force or effort: to be unable to tear oneself from a place.

COLLAPSE

verb (used without object)

to become torn.

to make a tear or rent.

10.

to move or behave with force, violent haste, or energy: The wind tore through the trees; cars tearing up and down the highway; I was tearing around all afternoon trying to find sandals for the beach.

noun

11.

the act of tearing.

12.

a rent or fissure. Synonyms: rip, rift, rupture.

13.

a rage or passion; violent flurry or outburst.

14.

Informal. a spree.

Verb phrases

15.

tear at,

to pluck violently at; attempt to tear: She tore at the bandages until they loosened.

to distress; afflict: remorse that tears at one's soul.

16.

tear down,

to pull down; destroy; demolish.

to disparage or discredit: to tear down one's friends behind their backs.

17.

tear into, Informal.

to attack impulsively and heedlessly: He tore into the food with a will.

to attack verbally: She tore into him for being late for dinner.

18.

tear off, Slang. to perform or do, especially rapidly or casually: to tear off a poem; to tear off a set of tennis.

19.

tear up,

to tear into small shreds: He tore up the drawings because she had criticized them. Synonyms: rip up.

to cancel or annul: to tear up a contract.

Idioms

20.

tear it, Slang. to ruin all hope; spoil everything.

21.

tear one's hair, to manifest extreme anxiety, grief, anger, or frustration: I'm so upset, I could just tear my hair out. Also, tear one's hair out.

Origin:
before 900; Middle English teren (v.), Old English teran; cognate with Dutch teren, German zehren to consume, Gothic distairan to destroy, Greek dérein to flay

Related forms

tear·a·ble, adjective

tear·a·ble·ness, noun

tear·er, noun

un·tear·a·ble, adjective

Synonyms
1. Tear, rend, rip mean to pull apart. To tear is to split the fibers of something by pulling apart, usually so as to leave ragged or irregular edges: to tear open a letter. Rend implies force or violence in tearing apart or in pieces: to rend one's clothes in grief. Rip implies vigorous tearing asunder, especially along a seam or line: to rip the sleeves out of a coat.

Link To torn

Collins

World English Dictionary

torn (tɔːn)

—vb
1.	the past participle of tear
2.	slang (Brit) that's torn it an unexpected event or circumstance has upset one's plans

—*adj*
3.	split or cut
4.	divided or undecided, as in preference: he was torn between staying and leaving

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Cite This Source

Etymonline

Word Origin & History

tear

"pull apart," O.E. teran (class IV strong verb; past tense tær, pp. toren), from P.Gmc. *teran (cf. O.S. terian, M.Du. teren "to consume," O.H.G. zeran "to destroy," Ger. zehren, Goth. ga-tairan "to tear, destroy"), from PIE *der- "tear" (cf. Skt. drnati "cleaves, bursts," Gk. derein "to flay,"

EXPAND

Arm. terem "I flay," O.C.S. dera "to burst asunder," Bret. darn "piece"). The O.E. past tense survived long enough to get into Bible translations as tare before giving place 17c. to tore, which is from the old pp. toren. Sense of "to pull by force" (away from some situation or attachment) is attested from 1297. The noun meaning "act of tearing" is attested from 1666. To be torn between two things (desires, loyalties, etc.) is from 1871.

torn

p.p. of tear, from O.E. getoren, p.p. of teran (see tear (v.)).

COLLAPSE

American Heritage

Medical Dictionary

tear ² (tēr)
n.
A drop of the clear salty liquid that is secreted by the lacrimal gland of the eye to lubricate the surface between the eyeball and eyelid and to wash away irritants.

American Heritage

Science Dictionary

tear (tîr) Pronunciation Key
A drop of the clear salty liquid secreted by glands (lacrimal glands) in the eyes. Tears wet the membrane covering the eye and help rid the eye of irritating substances.

Slang Dictionary

tear definition

[tɛr]

n.
a wild drinking bout. (See also rip.) : Sally is off on a tear again.

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source

tore (up) definition

and torn (up); tore down

mod.
distraught; emotionally upset. : Fred's really torn up about the accident.
mod.
alcohol or drug intoxicated. : He wasn't just drunk—he was massively tore up.

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source

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Matching Quote

"A country is strong which consists of wealthy families, every member of whom is interested in defending a common treasure; it is weak when composed of scattered individuals, to whom it matters little whether they obey seven or one, a Russian or a Corsican, so long as each keeps his own plot of land, blind in their wretched egotism, to the fact that the day is coming when this too will be torn from them."

-Honoré De Balzac

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