Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To put clothes on; clothe.
- intransitive verb To furnish with clothing.
- intransitive verb To decorate or adorn.
- intransitive verb To garnish.
- intransitive verb To arrange a display in.
- intransitive verb To arrange (troops) in ranks; align.
- intransitive verb To apply medication, bandages, or other therapeutic materials to (a wound).
- intransitive verb To arrange and groom (the hair), as by styling, combing, or washing.
- intransitive verb To groom (an animal); curry.
- intransitive verb To fertilize (land or plants).
- intransitive verb Archaic To cultivate (land or plants).
- intransitive verb To clean (fish or fowl) for cooking or sale.
- intransitive verb To put a finish on (stone or wood, for example).
- intransitive verb To tan or prepare (a hide) in leather-making.
- intransitive verb To put on clothes.
- intransitive verb To wear clothes of a certain kind or style.
- intransitive verb To wear formal clothes.
- intransitive verb To get into proper alignment with others.
- noun Clothing; apparel.
- noun A style of clothing.
- noun A one-piece outer garment for women or girls.
- noun Outer covering or appearance; guise.
- adjective Suitable for formal occasions.
- adjective Requiring formal clothes.
- idiom (dress ship) To display the ensign, signal flags, and bunting on a ship.
from The Century Dictionary.
- In veg. pathol., to treat (grain and other seed) with hot water, formaldehyde solution, or a similar fungicide, for the purpose of destroying the spores of smut and other plant-diseases.
- In milling, to clean and refine (flour); free (flour) from bran by passing it through bolters. See
milling . - noun In printing, a set of types with their appurtenances; also, their arrangement and their general appearance in print.
- noun A garment, or the assemblage of garments, used as a covering for the body or for its adornment; clothes; apparel: as, to spend a good deal of money on dress.
- noun Specifically
- noun The gown or robe worn by women, consisting of a skirt and a waist, either made separately or in one garment.
- noun Outward adornment; elegant clothing, or skill in selecting, combining, and adjusting articles of clothing: as, a love of dress; a man of dress.
- noun In ornithology, plumage: as, spring or autumn dress; the breeding dress.
- noun External finish: used especially of the arrangement of the furrows on a millstone.
- noun Size; dressing.
- noun Synonyms Clothing, raiment, habiliments, accoutrements, vestments, habit, attire, array, garb, costume, suit.
- To put or make straight; adjust to a right line: as (in military use), to dress ranks.
- To regulate; direct; set right; keep in the right course.
- To adjust; fasten; fix.
- To address; direct: as, to
dress words to a person; hence, with reflexive pronoun, to direct or turn one's course, efforts, or attention; prepare or apply one's self to do something; repair; betake one's self: as, they dressed themselves to the dance. - To prepare or make ready; treat in some particular way, and thus fit for some special use or purpose
- To prepare for use as food, by cooking or by the addition of suitable condiments, etc.: as, to
dress meat; to dress a salad. - To make fit for the purpose intended, by some suitable process: as, to
dress beef for the market; to dress skins; to dress flax or hemp.
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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But usage inclines to the adding of the apostrophe and _s_ (_'s_) even if the singular noun does end in an _s_ sound; as, _Charles's book, Frances's dress, the mistress's dress_.
Practical Grammar and Composition Thomas Wood
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*checks new dress in meeror, frowns, removes furnace filter from back of dress*
WE HAS A PILLO - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger? 2008
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As you no doubt know, a dress is such a common article of modern attire, generally a one-piece outer garment for women or girls, that it is difficult to imagine that the word dress has not always referred to this garment.
Mark C. Miller: Man Asks Stupid Question; Receives Brilliant Answer Mark C. Miller 2011
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As you no doubt know, a dress is such a common article of modern attire, generally a one-piece outer garment for women or girls, that it is difficult to imagine that the word dress has not always referred to this garment.
Mark C. Miller: Man Asks Stupid Question; Receives Brilliant Answer Mark C. Miller 2011
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And the glove for the latin dress is for the wrong hand.
I got my dresses... 2006
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And the glove for the latin dress is for the wrong hand.
Archive 2006-07-01 2006
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This is, of course, actually the original meaning of the term dress code, which has since come to mean something far less important.
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I think this dress is my favorite of all the ones you've posted in this series.
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The silhouette of the dress is also flattering and very va-va-voom.
Una LaMarche: Project Runway Episode 4 Recap: Cooter Couture Una LaMarche 2010
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The catalogue entry drily notes that the dress is a form of product placement: "a virtual advertisement of the duke's revival of the silk industry in Florence".
Bronzino's Medici portraits – review James Hall 2010
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The idea of a “nap dress” is wild for a lot of different reasons—one being the fact that a dress you sleep in is just a nightgown, and if you actively are putting on a separate dress in order to take a nap in the middle of the day, that just feels like too many steps.
A “Nap Dress” Is Not a Thing Rachel Leishman 2020
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