intonate
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈɪntəʊneɪt/
Forms: form: intonates
form: intonating
form: intonated
form: intonated
Etymology: First attested in 1795; borrowed from Medieval Latin intonātus, perfect passive participle of intonō (“to vocalize, chant”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from in- (inchoative prefix) + tonus (“pitch, tone”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix); doublet of intone. Cognate with French entonner, Italian intonare.
Senses: examples: text: […] we have no doubt whatever that the recitation of verse on the stage was of an artificial and semi-musical character. It was undoubtedly much more sustained and intonated with a slow and measured stateliness, which, whilst harmonizing it with the other circumstances of solemnity in Greek tragedy, would bring it nearer to music.
ref: 1840 February, Thomas De Quincey, “Theory of Greek Tragedy”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume 47, number 292, page 153:
text: His manner on the platform and his speech were those of a drony, sing-song, intonating Episcopal minister, devoid of life and spirit.
ref: 1911, Charles Clinton Nourse, chapter 2, in Autobiography, Cedar Rapids, Iowa:
text: With actorlike polish he intonated through the third page […]
ref: 1985, David H. Rothman, chapter 10, in The Silicon Jungle, New York: Ballantine, page 171:
glosses: To intone or recite (words), especially emphatically or in a chanting manner.
examples: text: “Is this Mr. O’Connor’s chamber?” inquired a voice of peculiar richness, intonated not unpleasingly with a certain melodious modification of the brogue […]
ref: 1845 Jun, Sheridan Le Fanu, chapter 6, in The Cock and the Anchor, volume 1, Dublin: William Curry, page 74:
text: Miss Bremer talked plentifully in her strange manner—good English enough for a foreigner, but so oddly intonated and accented, that it is impossible to be sure of more than one word in ten.
ref: 1858 January 6 – 1862 August 15 (date written), Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Rome”, in Passages from the French and Italian Note-books of Nathaniel Hawthorne, volume I, London: Strahan & Co., […], published 1871, →OCLC, page 274:
text: […] an older man, attired in gray, with hair to match, was busily engaged at one end of the room packing a quantity of small cases into a larger one, and continuing to hold converse with himself by means of the monosyllable “yes,” differently intonated, at intervals of half-a-minute, “y-e-s—y-e-s.”
ref: 1882, chapter 6, in Road Scrapings: Coaches and Coaching, London: Tinsley Brothers, page 92:
text: […] another child of foreign parentage intonates his English with the cadence peculiar to the language of his parents.
ref: 1920, Paul Klapper, chapter 8, in Teaching Children to Read, New York: Appleton, page 118:
glosses: To say or speak with a certain intonation.
examples: text: The composer so ordered it, that the king’s part should be one holding note, in a pitch proper for a Contratenor, for that was the king’s voice. Nor was he inattentive to other particulars, for he contrived his own part, which was the Bass, in such a manner, that every other note he sung was an octave to that of the king, which prevented his majesty from deviating from that single note which he was to intonate.
ref: 1776, John Hawkins, A General History of the Science and Practice of Music, Volume 2, Book 4, Chapter 3 p. 431:
text: 1844, The order for morning and evening prayer, and the Litany : with plain-tune, according to the use of the United Church of England and Ireland, London: J. Burns,Editor’s Preface,
A comma or colon was intonated by the fall of a minor third from the key-note on the ultimate or penultimate and ultimate syllables of the clause […]
glosses: To intone or vocalize (musical notes); to sound the tones of the musical scale; to practise the sol-fa.
Related terms: intonation