start
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /stɑːt/
enpr: stärt
ipa: /stɑɹt/
enpr: stärt
ipa: /stɑɹt/
ipa: [stäɹt]
note: Ottawa Valley
ipa: /stæɹt/
rhymes: -ɑː(ɹ)t
Forms: form: starts
form: starting
form: started
form: started
Etymology: From Middle English sterten (“to leap up suddenly, rush out”), from Old English styrtan (“to leap up, start”), from Proto-West Germanic *sturtijan (“to startle, move, set in motion”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ter- (“to be stiff”). Cognate with Old Frisian stirta (“to fall down, tumble”), Middle Dutch sterten (“to rush, fall, collapse”) (Dutch storten), Old High German sturzen (“to hurl, plunge, turn upside down”) (German stürzen), Old High German sterzan (“to be stiff, protrude”). More at stare.
Senses: examples: text: to start a stream of water; to start a rumour; to start a business
text: I was some years ago engaged in conversation with a fashionable French Abbe, upon a subject which the people of that kingdom love to start in discourse.
ref: April 2, 1716, Joseph Addison, Freeholder No. 30
text: In the autumn there was a row at some cement works about the unskilled labour men. A union had just been started for them and all but a few joined. One of these blacklegs was laid for by a picket and knocked out of time.
ref: 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XXII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
glosses: To begin, commence, initiate.
To set in motion.
examples: text: The President fired the gun to start the footrace.
text: The rain started at 9:00.
text: Imagine a country where children do nothing but play until they start compulsory schooling at age seven. Then, without exception, they attend comprehensives until the age of 16. Charging school fees is illegal, and so is sorting pupils into ability groups by streaming or setting.
ref: 2013 July 19, Peter Wilby, “Finland spreads word on schools”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 30:
text: Thinks I to myself, “Sol, you're run off your course again. This is a rich man's summer ‘cottage’ […].” So I started to back away again into the bushes. But I hadn't backed more'n a couple of yards when I see something so amazing that I couldn't help scooching down behind the bayberries and looking at it.
ref: 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
glosses: To begin, commence, initiate.
To begin.
examples: text: to start the engine
glosses: To begin, commence, initiate.
To ready the operation of a vehicle or machine.
glosses: To begin, commence, initiate.
To put or raise (a question, an objection); to put forward (a subject for discussion).
examples: text: Sensual men agree in the pursuit of every pleasure they can start.
ref: 1674, William Temple, letter to The Countess of Essex:
glosses: To begin, commence, initiate.
To bring onto being or into view; to originate; to invent.
examples: text: The speed limit is 50 km/h, starting at the edge of town.
text: The blue line starts one foot away from the wall.
glosses: To have its origin (at), begin.
examples: text: But if he start,
 It is the flesh of a corrupted heart.
ref: c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene v]:
text: I could a Tale vnfold, vvhoſe lighteſt vvord
 VVould harrovv vp thy ſoule, freeze thy young blood,
 Make thy tvvo eyes like Starres, ſtart from their Spheres,
 Thy knotty and combined locks to part,
 And each particular haire to ſtand an end,
 Like Quilles vpon the fretfull Porpentine: […]
ref: c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene v], page 257, column 2:
text: I start as from some dreadful dream.
ref: 1681, John Dryden, The Spanish Fryar: Or, the Double Discovery. […], London: […] Richard Tonson and Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, (please specify the page number):
text: Keep your soul to the work when it is ready to start aside.
ref: 1725, Isaac Watts, Logick: Or, The Right Use of Reason in the Enquiry after Truth, […], 2nd edition, London: […] John Clark and Richard Hett, […], Emanuel Matthews, […], and Richard Ford, […], published 1726, →OCLC:
text: [...] The tempest's mocking elf
 Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf
 He strikes on, only when the timbers start.
ref: 1855, Robert Browning, Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came, section XXXI:
text: Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the portrait, and he started.
ref: 1891, Oscar Wilde, chapter VIII, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, London; New York, N.Y.; Melbourne, Vic.: Ward Lock & Co., →OCLC, page 139:
text: Physical poison would make them start from arsenicked bread; shall not the moral poison which is in it, make them start more promptly still from slave produce?
ref: 1836, Elizur Wright, Quarterly Anti-slavery Magazine, volume 2, page 162:
glosses: To move suddenly, from a previous state of rest; to startle.
To jerk, jump up, flinch, or draw back in surprise.
synonyms: jump
examples: text: I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became convulsed; [...]
ref: 1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], chapter IV, in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume I, London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC, page 100:
glosses: To move suddenly, from a previous state of rest; to startle.
To awaken suddenly.
examples: text: The hounds started a fox.
text: Upon malicious bravery dost thou come
 To start my quiet?
ref: c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:
glosses: To move suddenly, from a previous state of rest; to startle.
To disturb and set in motion; to alarm; to rouse; to cause to flee.
examples: text: the storm started the bolts in the vessel
text: One, by a fall in wrestling, started the end of the clavicle from the sternon.
ref: 1676, Richard Wiseman, Severall Chirurgicall Treatises, London: […] E. Flesher and J. Macock, for R[ichard] Royston […], and B[enjamin] Took, […], →OCLC:
text: [...] we could, with the greateſt eaſe, as well as clearneſs, ſee all objects, (ourſelves unſeen) only by applying our eyes cloſe to the crevice, where the moulding of a pannel had warp'd, or ſtarted a little on the other ſide.
ref: 1749, [John Cleland], “[Letter the First]”, in Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure [Fanny Hill], volume I, London: […] [Thomas Parker] for G. Fenton [i.e., Fenton and Ralph Griffiths] […], →OCLC, page 76:
english: Fanny Hill
translation: Fanny Hill
glosses: To move suddenly, from a previous state of rest; to startle.
To come loose, to break free of a firmly set position; to displace or loosen; to dislocate.
raw_tags: of an object
examples: text: The charge against Zagallo then is not so much that he started Ronaldo, but that when it should surely have been clear that the player was in no fit state to take part he kept him on.
ref: 2010, Brian Glanville, The Story of the World Cup: The Essential Companion to South Africa 2010, London: Faber and Faber, →ISBN, page 361:
text: “Look at Portu,” Michel insisted, “he scores goals and I never start him. He says: ‘You’re sinking me, but OK, I’ll just go out and score again.’”
ref: 2024 May 6, Sid Lowe, “Portu’s brilliant burst seals Girona’s top-four fairytale in the perfect way”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:
topics: hobbies
lifestyle
sports
glosses: To put into play.
examples: text: to start a water cask
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To pour out; to empty; to tap and begin drawing from.
examples: text: Have you started yet?
glosses: To begin one's menstrual cycle.
Synonyms: begin
Derived terms: astart
bump-start
get in the boat and start rowing
kick start
never start a land war in Asia
push-start
self-starting
start a family
start afresh
start a fresh hare
start a hare
start a hare running
start back
start back in
start back on
starter
start from where you are
start in
starting post
start in on
start into
start on at
start over
start the ball rolling
start-up
start up on
start with a clean sheet
start with a clean sheet of paper
start with a clean slate
to start with
when the looting starts, the shooting starts