DERIVE • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Derive

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/dərˈaɪv/ Listen

verb

Derive v. t. (past & past part. derived; pres. part. deriving)

To turn the course of, as water; to divert and distribute into subordinate channels; to diffuse; to communicate; to transmit; followed by to, into, on, upon. (Obs.) "For fear it (water) choke up the pits... they (the workman) derive it by other drains." "Her due loves derived to that vile witch's share." "Derived to us by tradition from Adam to Noah."

To receive, as from a source or origin; to obtain by descent or by transmission; to draw; to deduce; followed by from.

To trace the origin, descent, or derivation of; to recognize transmission of; as, he derives this word from the Anglo-Saxon. "From these two causes... an ancient set of physicians derived all diseases."

(Chem.) To obtain one substance from another by actual or theoretical substitution; as, to derive an organic acid from its corresponding hydrocarbon.

Synonyms: To trace; deduce; infer.

Derive v. i. To flow; to have origin; to descend; to proceed; to be deduced. "Power from heaven Derives, and monarchs rule by gods appointed."

See images of 'Derive'

Etymology of 'Derive'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Derive" Quotes from Famous Books

... influence over the public from the earliest ages of the world. Nor is the reason difficult to determine. Where one man takes delight in the subtleties of logic, ten derive pleasure from the indulgence of the fancy. The love of fiction is common to the unlettered savage as well as to the civilized European, and has marked alike the ancient and the modern world. The oldest surviving book, if we except the narrative of ...

— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various

... practise it. Disquisitions can have no connection with medicine, because physicians whose opinions have been directly opposed to one another have equally restored their patients to health; they did not derive their methods of cure from studying the occult causes about which they disputed, but from the experience they had of the remedies which they employed upon their patients. Medicine was not first discovered in consequence of reasoning, ...

— Outlines of Greek and Roman Medicine • James Sands Elliott

... generally ended in some such pleasantly erratic remarks. They never were tired of supposing that they were rich; and really, in default of being rich, it must be admitted that there is some consolation in being in a frame of mind which can derive happiness from ...

— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... for this useful development. I have told you how in the summer of each year the greater part of the Nile valley and the Nile delta is turned into a vast inland sea. To derive the greatest benefit from this water and yet survive the flood, it had been necessary at certain points to build dykes and small islands which would offer shelter for man and beast during the months of August and September. The construction of these little ...

— Ancient Man - The Beginning of Civilizations • Hendrik Willem Van Loon

... foreign empire except the Roman. Even our Norman invaders soon regarded our country as the centre of their power and not as a province. Nevertheless, nearly every strand of our interwoven ancestry has at one time or other suffered as a subject race, and perhaps from that source we derive the quality that Mark Twain perceived when at the Jubilee Procession of our Empire he observed, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." Perhaps also for this reason we raise the Recessional prayer for a humble ...

— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson

More quotes...