ASSUAGE

Pronunciation (US):

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does assuage mean? 

• ASSUAGE (verb)
  The verb ASSUAGE has 3 senses:

1. cause to be more favorably inclined; gain the good will of

2. satisfy (thirst)

3. provide physical relief, as from pain

  Familiarity information: ASSUAGE used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• ASSUAGE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they assuage    ... he / she / it assuages   
Past simple: assuaged   
Past participle: assuaged   
-ing form: assuaging   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Cause to be more favorably inclined; gain the good will of

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

appease; assuage; conciliate; gentle; gruntle; lenify; mollify; pacify; placate

Context example:

She managed to mollify the angry customer

Hypernyms (to "assuage" is one way to...):

calm; calm down; lull; quiet; quieten; still; tranquilize; tranquillise; tranquillize (make calm or still)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody
Something ----s somebody

Sentence example:

The performance is likely to assuage Sue

Sense 2

Meaning:

Satisfy (thirst)

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

Synonyms:

allay; assuage; quench; slake

Context example:

The cold water quenched his thirst

Hypernyms (to "assuage" is one way to...):

conform to; fill; fit; fulfil; fulfill; meet; satisfy (fill, satisfy or meet a want or need or condtion ro restriction)

"Assuage" entails doing...:

consume; have; ingest; take; take in (serve oneself to, or consume regularly)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Sense 3

Meaning:

Provide physical relief, as from pain

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

Synonyms:

alleviate; assuage; palliate; relieve

Context example:

This pill will relieve your headaches

Hypernyms (to "assuage" is one way to...):

ameliorate; amend; better; improve; meliorate (to make better)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "assuage"):

soothe (cause to feel better)

comfort; ease (lessen pain or discomfort; alleviate)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s something

Derivation:

assuagement (the feeling that comes when something burdensome is removed or reduced)

 Context examples 

As he told Martin, he had once gone three days without water, had done so voluntarily, in order to experience the exquisite delight of such a thirst assuaged.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

I cannot deny that I grieved for his grief, whatever that was, and would have given much to assuage it.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Food, however, became scarce, and I often spent the whole day searching in vain for a few acorns to assuage the pangs of hunger.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

He had noticed my flushed cheek and my bright eyes, and he set me down as being in a fever. So I was, but it was a fever which only one medicine could assuage.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“Without more directly referring to any latent ability that may possibly exist on my part, of wielding the thunderbolt, or directing the devouring and avenging flame in any quarter, I may be permitted to observe, in passing, that my brightest visions are for ever dispelled—that my peace is shattered and my power of enjoyment destroyed—that my heart is no longer in the right place—and that I no more walk erect before my fellow man. The canker is in the flower. The cup is bitter to the brim. The worm is at his work, and will soon dispose of his victim. The sooner the better. But I will not digress. “Placed in a mental position of peculiar painfulness, beyond the assuaging reach even of Mrs. Micawber's influence, though exercised in the tripartite character of woman, wife, and mother, it is my intention to fly from myself for a short period, and devote a respite of eight-and-forty hours to revisiting some metropolitan scenes of past enjoyment. Among other havens of domestic tranquillity and peace of mind, my feet will naturally tend towards the King's Bench Prison. In stating that I shall be (D. V.) on the outside of the south wall of that place of incarceration on civil process, the day after tomorrow, at seven in the evening, precisely, my object in this epistolary communication is accomplished.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

When she got home, she tried to assuage the pangs of remorse by spreading forth the lovely silk, but it looked less silvery now, didn't become her, after all, and the words 'fifty dollars' seemed stamped like a pattern down each breadth.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Anne, attending with all the strength and zeal, and thought, which instinct supplied, to Henrietta, still tried, at intervals, to suggest comfort to the others, tried to quiet Mary, to animate Charles, to assuage the feelings of Captain Wentworth.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

The mother's consternation was excessive; but it could not surpass the alarm of the Miss Steeles, and every thing was done by all three, in so critical an emergency, which affection could suggest as likely to assuage the agonies of the little sufferer.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

At the conclusion of the ceremonies, Beth retired to her room, overcome with emotion and lobster, but there was no place of repose, for the beds were not made, and she found her grief much assuaged by beating up the pillows and putting things in order.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)