abridge
verbUK /əˈbɹɪd͡ʒ/ · US /əˈbɹɪd͡ʒ/
Etymology From Middle English abreggen, abregge, abrigge (“curtail, lessen”), from Old French abregier, abreger, from Late Latin abbreviō, abbreviāre (“make brief”). Doublet of abbreviate.
1
Archaic To deprive; to cut off.
3
To make shorter; to shorten in duration or extent.
- She retired her self to Sebaste, and abridged her train from State to necessity.1639, Thomas Fuller, The Historie of the Holy Warre, Cambridge, Book 2, Chapter 31, p. 85:
- The bridegroom, perceiving his condition, abridged the visit […]1751, [Tobias] Smollett, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), London: Harrison and Co., […], →OCLC:
4
To shorten or contract by using fewer words, yet retaining the sense; to epitomize; to condense.
- It was still necessary for the man who had been formerly saluted by the highest authority as dictator of the English language to supply his wants by constant toil. He abridged his Dictionary. He proposed to bring out an edition of Shakespeare by subscription, and many subscribers sent in their names and laid down their money; but he soon found the task so little to his taste that he turned to more attractive employments.1911, Samuel Johnson, 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica:
- Such an episode in the Island's grand naval story her naval historians naturally abridge; one of them (G.P.R. James) candidly acknowledging that fain would he pass it over did not "impartiality forbid fastidiousness."1891, Henry Melville, chapter 3, in Billy Budd:
5
Cut short; truncate.
6
To curtail.
- He had his rights abridged by the crooked sheriff.
- Derived terms
- abridgable, abridgeable, abridged, abridgement, abridger, abridgment, reabridge
- Related terms
- unabridged