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Bite   /baɪt/   Listen
noun
Bite  n.  
1.
The act of seizing with the teeth or mouth; the act of wounding or separating with the teeth or mouth; a seizure with the teeth or mouth, as of a bait; as, to give anything a hard bite. "I have known a very good fisher angle diligently four or six hours for a river carp, and not have a bite."
2.
The act of puncturing or abrading with an organ for taking food, as is done by some insects.
3.
The wound made by biting; as, the pain of a dog's or snake's bite; the bite of a mosquito.
4.
A morsel; as much as is taken at once by biting.
5.
The hold which the short end of a lever has upon the thing to be lifted, or the hold which one part of a machine has upon another.
6.
A cheat; a trick; a fraud. (Colloq.) "The baser methods of getting money by fraud and bite, by deceiving and overreaching."
7.
A sharper; one who cheats. (Slang)
8.
(Print.) A blank on the edge or corner of a page, owing to a portion of the frisket, or something else, intervening between the type and paper.


verb
Bite  v. t.  (past bit; past part. bitten; pres. part. biting)  
1.
To seize with the teeth, so that they enter or nip the thing seized; to lacerate, crush, or wound with the teeth; as, to bite an apple; to bite a crust; the dog bit a man. "Such smiling rogues as these, Like rats, oft bite the holy cords atwain."
2.
To puncture, abrade, or sting with an organ (of some insects) used in taking food.
3.
To cause sharp pain, or smarting, to; to hurt or injure, in a literal or a figurative sense; as, pepper bites the mouth. "Frosts do bite the meads."
4.
To cheat; to trick; to take in. (Colloq.)
5.
To take hold of; to hold fast; to adhere to; as, the anchor bites the ground. "The last screw of the rack having been turned so often that its purchase crumbled,... it turned and turned with nothing to bite."
To bite the dust, To bite the ground, to fall in the agonies of death; as, he made his enemy bite the dust.
To bite in (Etching), to corrode or eat into metallic plates by means of an acid.
To bite the thumb at (any one), formerly a mark of contempt, designed to provoke a quarrel; to defy. "Do you bite your thumb at us?"
To bite the tongue, to keep silence.


Bite  v. i.  (past bit; past part. bitten; pres. part. biting)  
1.
To seize something forcibly with the teeth; to wound with the teeth; to have the habit of so doing; as, does the dog bite?
2.
To cause a smarting sensation; to have a property which causes such a sensation; to be pungent; as, it bites like pepper or mustard.
3.
To cause sharp pain; to produce anguish; to hurt or injure; to have the property of so doing. "At the last it (wine) biteth like serpent, and stingeth like an adder."
4.
To take a bait into the mouth, as a fish does; hence, to take a tempting offer.
5.
To take or keep a firm hold; as, the anchor bites.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Bite" Quotes from Famous Books



... drank, hacked at his ham-bone and ate. "By the Lord," he went on commenting, "they've not had bite or sup. Too busy with their match-making? Too delicate to feast without invitation? Which?" He pondered the puzzle. He had invited Manuela, he was sure: had he included her swain? If not, the thing was clear. She wouldn't eat without him, and he couldn't eat without his host. It was the ...
— The Spanish Jade • Maurice Hewlett
... came into the world almost black," and that this was the fact. This colour, which lasted for some time, was attributed to a picture which hung at the foot of his, mother's bed, and which she often looked at. It represented a Moor bringing to Cleopatra a basket of flowers, containing the asp by whose bite she destroyed herself. He said that she also told him, "You have a great deal of money about you, but it does not belong to you;" and that he had actually in his pocket two hundred Louis for the Duc de La Valliere. Lastly, he informed us ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... very much annoyed with him, and several of very good Reputation refused to come to Court till he was discarded. There were indeed some of them that defied his Sagacity, but it was observed, though he did not actually bite them, he would growle at them most confoundedly. To return to the Dogs of the Temple: After they had lived here in great Repute for several Years, it so happened, that as one of the Priests, who had been making a charitable Visit to a Widow who lived on the Promontory of ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... its blade was on the way to the button mouth. 'No!' as he paused and looked at her. 'Here's Mite's ball! poor little dear, do let him have it'—and Mite, reading sympathy in his aunt's face, laughed in a fascinating triumphant manner, and took a bite with his ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... preaching at Thursday lecture, thus taught Christ's love for men: "Suppose ye should catch six wolves in a trap ... [there were six Salem Quakers] and ye cannot prove that they killed either sheep or lambs; and now ye have them they will neither bark nor bite: yet they have the plain marks of wolves. Now I leave it to your consideration whether ye will let them go alive, yea or nay." [Footnote: ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams


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