SEVER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does sever mean? 

• SEVER (verb)
  The verb SEVER has 2 senses:

1. set or keep apart

2. cut off from a whole

  Familiarity information: SEVER used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SEVER (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they sever    ... he / she / it severs   
Past simple: severed   
Past participle: severed   
-ing form: severing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Set or keep apart

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

break up; sever

Context example:

sever a relationship

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

disunite; divide; part; separate (force, take, or pull apart)

Verb group:

discerp; lop; sever (cut off from a whole)

Sentence frames:

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

Derivation:

severance (a personal or social separation (as between opposing factions))

Sense 2

Meaning:

Cut off from a whole

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

discerp; lop; sever

Context example:

The soul discerped from the body

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

cut (separate with or as if with an instrument)

Verb group:

break up; sever (set or keep apart)

Sentence frames:

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

Derivation:

severance; severing (the act of severing)

 Context examples 

As he spoke he whirled the covering from the object in front of him and showed to their horror that it was a newly-severed human leg.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

A device designed to slice or sever a material.

(Cutter Device Component, NCI Thesaurus)

Holmes pointed to the wattles on the severed head.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

"Now is my time to slip away," thought I: but the tones that then severed the air arrested me.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Then I lay quiet, waiting to sever these last when the strain should be once more lightened by a breath of wind.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

This situation creates a stable TOP2-DPC complex, which leads to the accumulation of severed DNA that kills cells.

(DNA damage caused by cancer treatment reversed by ZATT protein, National Institutes of Health)

Until now, it has been hard to tell whether the fins come from protected sharks, as they might look quite similar when severed.

(New way to save endangered sharks – and our seafood, SciDev.Net)

When the antenna points just a few fractions of a degree away from Earth, communications will be severed permanently.

(Cassini Spacecraft Makes Its Final Approach to Saturn, NASA)

She could not endure that such a friendship as theirs should be severed unfairly.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

The severed trunk rolled to the very edge of our platform, and for one terrible second we all thought it was over.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)