PURGE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does purge mean? 

• PURGE (noun)
  The noun PURGE has 3 senses:

1. the act of clearing yourself (or another) from some stigma or charge

2. an act of removing by cleansing; ridding of sediment or other undesired elements

3. an abrupt or sudden removal of a person or group from an organization or place

  Familiarity information: PURGE used as a noun is uncommon.

• PURGE (verb)
  The verb PURGE has 7 senses:

1. oust politically

2. clear of a charge

3. make pure or free from sin or guilt

4. rid of impurities

5. rinse, clean, or empty with a liquid

6. eject the contents of the stomach through the mouth

7. excrete or evacuate (someone's bowels or body)

  Familiarity information: PURGE used as a verb is common.

 Dictionary entry details 

• PURGE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The act of clearing yourself (or another) from some stigma or charge

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

purgation; purge; purging

Hypernyms ("purge" is a kind of...):

clearing (the act of freeing from suspicion)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "purge"):

purification (the act of purging of sin or guilt; moral or spiritual cleansing)

Derivation:

purge (make pure or free from sin or guilt)

purge (clear of a charge)

Sense 2

Meaning:

An act of removing by cleansing; ridding of sediment or other undesired elements

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

purge; purging

Hypernyms ("purge" is a kind of...):

cleaning; cleansing; cleanup (the act of making something clean)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "purge"):

abreaction; catharsis; katharsis ((psychoanalysis) purging of emotional tensions)

catharsis; katharsis; purgation (purging the body by the use of a cathartic to stimulate evacuation of the bowels)

Derivation:

purge (rinse, clean, or empty with a liquid)

purge (rid of impurities)

Sense 3

Meaning:

An abrupt or sudden removal of a person or group from an organization or place

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Context example:

he died in a purge by Stalin

Hypernyms ("purge" is a kind of...):

removal (dismissal from office)

Derivation:

purge (oust politically)

• PURGE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they purge    ... he / she / it purges   
Past simple: purged   
Past participle: purged   
-ing form: purging   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Oust politically

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Context example:

Deng Xiao Ping was purged several times throughout his lifetime

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

oppress; persecute (cause to suffer)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Antonym:

rehabilitate (reinstall politically)

Derivation:

purge (an abrupt or sudden removal of a person or group from an organization or place)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Clear of a charge

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

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

acquit; assoil; clear; discharge; exculpate; exonerate (pronounce not guilty of criminal charges)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

purgation; purge (the act of clearing yourself (or another) from some stigma or charge)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Make pure or free from sin or guilt

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

purge; purify; sanctify

Context example:

he left the monastery purified

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

alter; change; modify (cause to change; make different; cause a transformation)

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

spiritualise; spiritualize (purify from the corrupting influences of the world)

lustrate (purify by means of a ritual; also used in post-Communist countries to refer to the political cleansing of former officials)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

purgation (a ceremonial cleansing from defilement or uncleanness by the performance of appropriate rites)

purge (the act of clearing yourself (or another) from some stigma or charge)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Rid of impurities

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Context example:

purge your mind

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

distill; make pure; purify; sublimate (remove impurities from, increase the concentration of, and separate through the process of distillation)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

purge (an act of removing by cleansing; ridding of sediment or other undesired elements)

purging (the act of clearing yourself (or another) from some stigma or charge)

purging (an act of removing by cleansing; ridding of sediment or other undesired elements)

Sense 5

Meaning:

Rinse, clean, or empty with a liquid

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

flush; purge; scour

Context example:

purge the old gas tank

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

rinse; rinse off (wash off soap or remaining dirt)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s something PP

Derivation:

purge (an act of removing by cleansing; ridding of sediment or other undesired elements)

Sense 6

Meaning:

Eject the contents of the stomach through the mouth

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

Synonyms:

barf; be sick; cast; cat; chuck; disgorge; honk; puke; purge; regorge; regurgitate; retch; sick; spew; spue; throw up; upchuck; vomit; vomit up

Context example:

The patient regurgitated the food we gave him last night

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

egest; eliminate; excrete; pass (eliminate from the body)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sense 7

Meaning:

Excrete or evacuate (someone's bowels or body)

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

Context example:

The doctor decided that the patient must be purged

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

care for; treat (provide treatment for)

Cause:

empty; evacuate; void (excrete or discharge from the body)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

purgation (purging the body by the use of a cathartic to stimulate evacuation of the bowels)

purgative (strongly laxative)

 Context examples 

A monoclonal antibody used to purge leukemia cells from bone marrow.

(Monoclonal Antibody MDX-22, NCI Thesaurus)

Prior to reinfusion the bone marrow is often treated to purge it of residual tumor cells.

(Autologous bone marrow transplantation, NCI Thesaurus)

His eyes were shining like an angel's, and his face was transfigured, purged of all earthly dross, and pure and holy.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

When I went out to the Commons, I charged Mrs. Crupp with particular directions to leave the windows open, that my sitting-room might be aired, and purged of his presence.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

All the feuds of countless generations, all the hatreds and cruelties of their narrow history, all the memories of ill-usage and persecution were to be purged that day.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Types of eating disorders include: • Anorexia nervosa, in which you become too thin, but you don't eat enough because you think you are fat • Bulimia nervosa, which involves periods of overeating followed by purging, sometimes through self-induced vomiting or using laxatives • Binge-eating, which is out-of-control eating

(Eating Disorders, NIH: National Institute of Mental Health)

Their next business is from herbs, minerals, gums, oils, shells, salts, juices, sea-weed, excrements, barks of trees, serpents, toads, frogs, spiders, dead men’s flesh and bones, birds, beasts, and fishes, to form a composition, for smell and taste, the most abominable, nauseous, and detestable, they can possibly contrive, which the stomach immediately rejects with loathing, and this they call a vomit; or else, from the same store-house, with some other poisonous additions, they command us to take in at the orifice above or below (just as the physician then happens to be disposed) a medicine equally annoying and disgustful to the bowels; which, relaxing the belly, drives down all before it; and this they call a purge, or a clyster.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

We passed the night at the old house, which, freed from the presence of the Heeps, seemed purged of a disease; and I lay in my old room, like a shipwrecked wanderer come home.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Down below where he lived was the ignoble, and he wanted to purge himself of the ignoble that had soiled all his days, and to rise to that sublimated realm where dwelt the upper classes.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)