run down
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Forms: form: runs down
form: running down
form: ran down
form: run down
Senses: examples: text: He was run down while crossing the main road.
glosses: To hit someone with a car or other vehicle and injure or kill them.
examples: text: Whatever the company says, the media is going to run them down.
text: My sister is always running me down in front of my friends.
text: Don't run yourself down so much!
text: Ha! ha! ha! 'tis very hard for them to leave a subject they have not quite run down.
ref: 1777, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, I.i:
text: Since I have put my name in GCN and received my first paper, I have only received two letters. But the one that pissed me off […] was from Bible belt hypocrite. He sent me an envelope full of tracts about homosexuality. Well, I have this to say to whoever he is (The person that's got nothing better to do than get the GCN to see who he can run down should take a damn good look at himself).
ref: 1981 February 14, Richard Credill, “Take Him By The Hand”, in Gay Community News, volume 8, number 29, page 5:
glosses: To criticize someone or an organisation, often unfairly.
examples: text: I finally managed to run down that report. I had filed it incorrectly.
synonyms: run to earth#Verb
run to ground#Verb
coordinate_terms: run in#English:_arrest or especially track down and arrest
glosses: To find something or someone after searching for a long time.
examples: text: You need to wind up the clock every day so that it doesn't run down.
text: If you don't switch off the car lights, you will run the battery down.
glosses: To lose power slowly. Used for a machine, battery, or other powered device.
examples: text: Running down the list of suggestions, I can see three we can discard immediately.
glosses: To read quickly a list or other short text.
examples: text: When the minute was up, John Jay managed to make the woman twice as nervous as he ran down the rules and the possibilities.
ref: 2013, Nora Roberts, The Name of the Game:
glosses: To describe in the form of a rundown, a rough outline or summary.
examples: text: The board of directors have decided to run down the stocks held in storage prior to offering the company for sale.
text: Social media has been full of strident criticism of a Government perceived as pursuing a conscious policy to run down - even destroy - our railway.
ref: 2022 November 30, Nigel Harris, “A bid to break the other side?”, in RAIL, number 971, page 3:
glosses: To reduce the size or stock levels of a business, often with a view to closure.
examples: text: to run down in health
text: TravelWatch SouthWest Chairman Chris Irwin said: "This is intolerable. The South West deserves levelling up, not running down. SWR and its sponsors in the Department of Transport must be called to account."
ref: 2022 January 26, Paul Clifton, “"Intolerable" service cuts under emergency COVID timetables”, in RAIL, number 949, page 8:
glosses: To decline in quality or condition.
examples: text: to run down a stag
topics: hobbies
hunting
lifestyle
glosses: To chase till the object pursued is captured or exhausted.
examples: text: The Jylland only missed running down a schooner by a few yards in the fog; it was a near thing—near enough, in fact, to allow of some shouted remarks between those on the bridge of the motorship and the man at the wheel of the schooner to be clearly heard.
ref: 1943 May and June, Chas. S. Lake, “Some Continental Travel Experiences (1922-1939)—III”, in Railway Magazine, page 143:
text: Hiei now loomed into the action, causing the leading U.S. destroyers to scatter before the oncoming behemoth lest they be run down.
ref: 2021 March 10, Drachinifel, 14:35 from the start, in Guadalcanal Campaign - The Big Night Battle: Night 1 (IJN 3(?) : 2 USN), archived from the original on 17 Oct 2022:
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To run against and sink, as a vessel.
examples: text: Religion is […]run down by the prevailing licence of these times.
ref: 1736, George Berkeley, A Discourse addressed to Magistrates and Men of Authority:
glosses: To crush; to overthrow; to overbear.
examples: text: He ran down on Rashad and them.
qualifier: African-American Vernacular
glosses: To approach (someone, thing or place) aggressively, as to attack.
examples: text: If they occasionally supply any additional copy after this element, run it down with a manual line break.
topics: media
publishing
typography
coordinate_terms: run in#Verb
glosses: To move (some copy) down to the next line.
Synonyms: sense: hit with a vehicle
word: run over
sense: hit with a vehicle
word: knock down
sense: criticise
word: put down
sense: criticise
word: demean
sense: criticise
word: berate
sense: locate
word: track down