contain
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: kən-tānʹ
ipa: /kənˈteɪn/
rhymes: -eɪn
Forms: form: contains
form: containing
form: contained
form: contained
Etymology: From Middle English, borrowed from Old French contenir, from Latin continēre (“to hold or keep together, comprise, contain”), combined form of con- (“together”) + teneō (“to hold”).
Senses: examples: text: The brown box contains three stacks of books.
text: At half-past nine on this Saturday evening, the parlour of the Salutation Inn, High Holborn, contained most of its customary visitors. […] In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.
ref: 1892, Walter Besant, chapter III, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:
text: [The researchers] noticed many of their pieces of [plastic marine] debris sported surface pits around two microns across. Such pits are about the size of a bacterial cell. Closer examination showed that some of these pits did, indeed, contain bacteria,[…].
ref: 2013 July 20, “Welcome to the plastisphere”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:
glosses: To hold inside.
examples: text: Most of the meals they offer contain meat.
text: Manganism has been known about since the 19th century, when miners exposed to ores containing manganese, a silvery metal, began to totter, slur their speech and behave like someone inebriated.
ref: 2014 April 21, “Subtle effects”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8884:
glosses: To include as a part.
examples: text: I'm so excited, I can hardly contain myself!
text: Fear not, my lord: we can contain ourselves.
ref: c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act INDUCTION, scene i]:
text: [The king's] only Person is oftentimes instead of an Army, to contain the unruly People from a thousand evil Occasions.
ref: 1596 (date written; published 1633), Edmund Spenser, A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande […], Dublin: […] Societie of Stationers, […], →OCLC; republished as A View of the State of Ireland […] (Ancient Irish Histories), Dublin: […] Society of Stationers, […] Hibernia Press, […] [b]y John Morrison, 1809, →OCLC:
text: Athelstan Arundel walked home all the way, foaming and raging. No omnibus, cab, or conveyance ever built could contain a young man in such a rage. His mother lived at Pembridge Square, which is four good measured miles from Lincoln's Inn.
ref: 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC, page 16:
text: There she goes / There she goes again / Racing through my brain / And I just can't contain / This feeling that remains
ref: 1988, Lee Mavers, “There She Goes”, in Sixpence None the Richer, performed by Sixpence None the Richer, published 1997:
glosses: To put constraints upon; to restrain; to confine; to keep within bounds.
examples: text: A group contains a unique inverse for each of its elements.
text: If that subgraph contains the vertex in question then it must be spanning.
topics: mathematics
sciences
glosses: To have as an element or subset.
raw_tags: of a set etc.
examples: text: But if they cannot contain, let them marry.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Bible Corinthians/#8 1 Corinthians:8–9:
glosses: To restrain desire; to live in continence or chastity.
Synonyms: sense: hold inside
word: enclose
sense: hold inside
word: inhold
sense: include as part
word: comprise
sense: include as part
word: embody
sense: include as part
word: incorporate
sense: include as part
word: inhold
sense: limit by restraint
word: control
word: curb
word: repress
word: restrain
word: restrict
word: stifle
Derived terms: containee
contain multitudes
contain oneself
melanopsin-containing retinal ganglion cell
self-contain
Related terms: container
containable
containment
content
continence