try
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: trī
ipa: /tɹaɪ/
ipa: [t͡ʃɹaɪ̯]
ipa: [tɹ̝̊aɪ̯]
ipa: [t̠͡ɹ̠̊˔aɪ̯]
ipa: [t̠͡ɹ̠̊˔ʷaɪ̯]
ipa: /tɹaɪ/
ipa: /tɹʌɪ/
ipa: [tɹəi̯]
rhymes: -aɪ
Forms: form: tries
form: trying
form: tried
form: tried
form: no-table-tags
form: glossary
form: try
form: try
form: tried
form: try
form: triest
form: tried
form: triedst
form: tries
form: trieth
form: tried
form: try
form: tried
form: try
form: tried
form: try
form: -
form: trying
form: tried
form: trie
Etymology: From Middle English trien (“to separate out, sift, choose, select, evaluate, try a legal case”), from Anglo-Norman trier, triher, triere (“to divide, separate, choose, select, prove, determine, try a case”), Old French trier (“to choose, pick out or separate from others, sift, cull”), of uncertain origin. Cognate with Occitan triar (“to choose, sort, scrutinise, peel”), Catalan triar (“to pick, choose, decide”). Suggested to be derived from Late Latin *trītāre (“to crush, grind, trample, wear out”), itself derived from Classical Latin trītus (“rubbed, worn down, pulverised”), the past participle of terō, terere (“to rub, wear down, trample”), though this derivation is incompatible with the Occitan form. Additionally, the shift in meaning from "rub, crush, trample" to "pick out, choose, cull" is difficult to explain. One suggestion is that the semantic shift might have originated from a Latin phrase *granum terere ("to tread the corn (in threshing)"; compare Latin trītūra (“rubbing, chafing, friction" also "threshing”)), which has a parallel in the modern French trier le grain (“to sort the grain”). Alternatively, perhaps derived from Vulgar Latin *trīāre, a metathetic alteration of *tīrāre (“to tear off, pull, draw”), whence also Old French tirer (“to draw, pull, pluck, tug, peck at, extract”), Occitan tirar (“to take, draw, retrieve, remove, extract”).
Replaced native Middle English cunnen (“to try”) (from Old English cunnian), Middle English fandien (“to try, prove”) (from Old English fandian), and Middle English costnien (“to try, tempt, test”) (from Old English costnian).
Senses: examples: text: I tried to rollerblade, but I couldn’t.
text: Can you start the car? —I'll try (to).
text: Not unnaturally, “Auntie” took this communication in bad part. Thus outraged, she showed herself to be a bold as well as a furious virago. Next day she found her way to their lodgings and tried to recover her ward by the hair of the head.
ref: 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XLIV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC, page 361:
text: Skywalker: Alright... I'll give it a try.
Yoda: NO! Try not! Do, or do not. There is no "try".
ref: 1980, Leigh Brackett et al., The Empire Strikes Back:
text: [Isaac Newton] was obsessed with alchemy. He spent hours copying alchemical recipes and trying to replicate them in his laboratory. He believed that the Bible contained numerological codes.
ref: 2014 June 21, “Magician’s brain”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8892:
glosses: To attempt; to endeavour. Followed by infinitive.
examples: text: […]euery feend his buſie paines applyde, / To melt the golden metall, ready to be tryde.
ref: 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, page 281:
glosses: To divide; to separate.
To separate (precious metal etc.) from the ore by melting; to purify, refine.
examples: text: to try out the wild corn from the good
text: the wylde corne, beinge in shap and greatnesse lyke to the good, if they be mengled, with great difficultie will be tried out
ref: 1531, Thomas Elyot, The Boke Named the Governour […], London: […] Tho[mas] Bertheleti, →OCLC:
glosses: To divide; to separate.
To winnow; to sift; to pick out; frequently followed by out.
qualifier: one sort from another
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To divide; to separate.
To extract oil from blubber or fat; to melt down blubber to obtain oil
glosses: To divide; to separate.
To extract wax from a honeycomb
examples: text: I tried mixing more white paint to get a lighter shade.
glosses: To test, to work out.
To make an experiment. Usually followed by a present participle.
examples: text: I shall try my skills on this.
text: The Celebrity, by arts unknown, induced Mrs. Judge Short and two other ladies to call at Mohair on a certain afternoon when Mr. Cooke was trying a trotter on the track. The three returned wondering and charmed with Mrs. Cooke; they were sure she had had no hand in the furnishing of that atrocious house.
ref: 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, page 58:
text: “So mousie shall only find tins on the floor now,” thought Miss Mapp. “Mousie shall try his teeth on tins.”
ref: 1922, E. F. Benson, Miss Mapp, p. 89:
text: Plant breeding is always a numbers game.[…]The wild species we use are rich in genetic variation, and individual plants are highly heterozygous and do not breed true. In addition, we are looking for rare alleles, so the more plants we try, the better.
ref: 2013 May-June, David Van Tassel, Lee DeHaan, “Wild Plants to the Rescue”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:
glosses: To test, to work out.
To put to test.
examples: text: You are trying my patience.
text: Don't try me.
glosses: To test, to work out.
To test someone's patience.
examples: text: Mona: Try this vampire bolt on for size!
Cedric: Why don't you try this alien bolt?
ref: 1999, Mona the Vampire, "The X-Change Student" (season 1, episode 6a)
glosses: To test, to work out.
To receive an imminent attack; to take.
raw_tags: used in the imperative
examples: text: Oh, you need to try the soup of the day!
text: Calvin: What's this disgusting slimy blob?
Dad: Try it. You'll love it.
ref: 1986 January 22, Bill Watterson, Calvin & Hobbes (comic):
glosses: To test, to work out.
To taste, sample, etc.
examples: text: to try weights or measures by a standard;  to try a person's opinions
text: Let the end try the man.
ref: c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]. Epilogue.”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii], page 80, column 2:
glosses: To test, to work out.
To prove by experiment; to apply a test to, for the purpose of determining the quality; to examine; to prove; to test.
examples: text: I'll try whether I can make it across town on foot.
text: Sir, the doctors and apothecaries are the greatest thieves in the world; they are always trying which can rob their patients the most.
ref: 1785, James Ridgway, A Dictionary of Literary Conversation:
glosses: To test, to work out.
To attempt to determine (by experiment or effort).
raw_tags: with indirect interrogative clause
examples: text: He was tried and executed.
text: The murderer, he recalled, had been tried and sentenced to imprisonment for life, but was pardoned by a merciful governor after serving a year of his sentence.
ref: 1900, Charles W[addell] Chesnutt, chapter I, in The House Behind the Cedars, Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company […], →OCLC:
text: I sit in front of the mirror and try myself. I am no impartial judge, otherwise I would have had myself executed several times over by now.
ref: 1987, Hadi Khorsandi, “It Didn’t Quite Work Out—2”, in Ehssan Javan, transl., The Ayatollah and I:
text: Sansa pretends to gather everyone in the great hall to try Arya, and at the last moment reveals she’s actually trying Littlefinger for murder and treason, although I think everyone in that room already knew what was going on except him.
ref: 2017 August 27, Brandon Nowalk, “Game Of Thrones slows down for the longest, and best, episode of the season (newbies)”, in The Onion AV Club:
topics: law
glosses: To test, to work out.
To put on trial.
examples: text: […]try the Lybian Heat, or Scythian Cold.
ref: 1697, Virgil, “The First Pastoral. Or, Tityrus and Melibœus.”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, page 4, line 88:
text: Never more
Mean I to trie what rash untri'd I sought,
The paine of absence from thy sight.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
glosses: To experiment, to strive.
To have or gain knowledge of by experience.
examples: text: Dad, for God's sake, I'm trying my best!
text: You are trying too hard.
glosses: To experiment, to strive.
To work on something with one's best effort and focus.
examples: text: How do you try! (i.e., how do you do?)
glosses: To experiment, to strive.
To do; to fare.
examples: text: to try rival claims by a duel;  to try conclusions
text: […]Left I the Court, to ſee this Quarrell try’de.
ref: 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii], page 128, column 2:
glosses: To experiment, to strive.
To settle; to decide; to determine; specifically, to decide by an appeal to arms.
glosses: To experiment, to strive.
To attempt to conceive a child.
raw_tags: of a couple
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To lie to in heavy weather under just sufficient sail to head into the wind.
examples: text: The light tries his eyes.
text: Repeated failures try one's patience.
glosses: To strain; to subject to excessive tests.
examples: text: I am really not trying to hear you talk about my mama like that.
qualifier: chiefly African-American Vernacular
glosses: To want, to desire.
raw_tags: used with another verb
Synonyms: sense: to attempt
word: attempt
sense: to attempt
word: endeavor
sense: to attempt
word: fand
sense: to attempt
word: mint
sense: to attempt
word: take a run at
sense: to attempt
word: take a stab at
sense: to strive
word: strive
sense: to strive
word: put
sense: to strive
word: keep
sense: to strive
word: etc. one's nose to the grindstone
sense: to strive
word: put one's back into
sense: to strive
word: give 110%
sense: to strive
word: break one's back
sense: to strive
word: work hard
sense: to strive
word: apply oneself
sense: to taste, sample, etc
word: sample
sense: to taste, sample, etc
word: taste
Derived terms: sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: don't diet, try it
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: don't knock it till you've tried it
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: don't try this at home
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: don't try to teach grandma how to suck eggs
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: for lack of trying
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: I'd like to see someone try
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: I like to see you try
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: must-try
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: right to try
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try as one may
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try as one might
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try conclusions
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try for size
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-hard
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: trying
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try it on
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try it on the dog
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try me
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-miter square
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: tryna
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-off
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try on
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-on
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try one's hand
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try one's luck
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try one's wings
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try out
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-out
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-outs
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try pot
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try someone's patience
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try square
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try-square
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try the veal
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: try titles
sense: Terms derived from the verb try
word: trywork
Related terms: sense: Terms etymologically related to the verb try
word: trial
sense: Terms etymologically related to the verb try
word: tried and tested
sense: Terms etymologically related to the verb try
word: tried and true
sense: Terms etymologically related to the verb try
word: trier