dress
pronunciation
How to pronounce dress in British English:
UK [dres]
How to pronounce dress in American English:
US [dres]
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- Noun:
- a one-piece garment for a woman; has skirt and bodice
- clothing of a distinctive style or for a particular occasion
- clothing in general
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- Verb:
- put on clothes
- provide with clothes or put clothes on
- put a finish on
- dress in a certain manner
- dress or groom with elaborate care
- kill and prepare for market or consumption
- arrange in ranks
- decorate (food), as with parsley or other ornamental foods
- provide with decoration
- put a dressing on
- cultivate, tend, and cut back the growth of
- cut down rough-hewn (lumber) to standard thickness and width
- convert into leather
- apply a bandage or medication to
- give a neat appearance to
- arrange attractively
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- Adjective:
- suitable for formal occasions
- (of an occasion) requiring formal clothes
Word Origin
- dress
- dress: [14] Dress originally meant literally ‘put right, put straight’. It comes via Old French dresser from Vulgar Latin *dīrectiāre, a derivative of Latin dīrectus ‘straight’ (from which English gets direct). Traces of this underlying sense survive in the word’s application to the correct aligning of columns of troops, but its main modern signification, ‘clothe’, comes via a more generalized line of semantic development ‘prepare’ (as in ‘dress a turkey for the oven’), and hence ‘array, equip’. (English address developed in parallel with dress, and comes from the same ultimate source.) Dresser ‘sideboard’ [15] was borrowed from Old French dresseur, a derivative of dresser in the sense ‘prepare’.=> address, direct
- dress (v.)
- early 14c., "make straight; direct, guide, control, prepare for cooking," from Old French dresser, drecier "raise (oneself), address, prepare, lift, raise, hoist, set up, arrange, set (a table), serve (food), straighten, put right, direct," from Vulgar Latin *directiare, from Latin directus "direct, straight" (see direct (v.)). Sense of "decorate, adorn" is late 14c., as is that of "put on clothing." Original sense survives in military meaning "align columns of troops." Dress up "attire elaborately" is from 1670s; dressing down "wearing clothes less formal than expected" is from 1960. To dress (someone) down (1769) is ironical. Related: Dressed; dressing.
- dress (n.)
- c. 1600, originally any clothing, especially that appropriate to rank or to some ceremony; sense of "woman's garment" is first recorded 1630s, with overtones of "made not merely to clothe but to adorn." Dress rehearsal first recorded 1828.
Example
- 1. This dress isn 't big enough for her .
- 2. You even dress like him and talk like him .
- 3. And a new dress costs over four hundred frances .
- 4. To prolong the flight some have turned to fancy dress .
- 5. She was in a bright yellow dress .