definition of the word die

• enPR: dī, IPA: /daɪ/, SAMPA: /daI/
•  Audio (US)^{help, file}
• Rhymes: -aɪ
• Homophones: dye, Di, Dai, daye

From Middle English dien, deien < Old Norse deyja (“‘to die, pass away’”), from Proto-Germanic *dawjanan, from Proto-Indo-European *dheu- (“‘to die, pass away, become senseless’”).

to die (third-person singular simple present dies, present participle dying, simple past and past participle died)

1. (intransitive) To stop living; to become dead; to undergo death.
   1. Followed by of. General use.
      • 1839, Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist, Penguin 1985, p. 87:

        "What did she die of, Work'us?" said Noah. "Of a broken heart, some of our old nurses told me," replied Oliver.

      • 2000, Stephen King, On Writing, Pocket Books 2002, p. 85:

        In 1971 or 72, Mom's sister Carolyn Weimer died of breast cancer.

   2. Followed by from. General use, though somewhat more common in medical or scientific contexts.
      • 1865, British Medical Journal, 4 Mar 1865, p. 213:

        She lived several weeks; but afterwards she died from epilepsy, to which malady she had been previously subject.

      • 2007, Frank Herbert & Kevin J. Anderson, Sandworms of Dune, Tor 2007, p. 191:

        ""Or all of them will die from the plague. Even if most of the candidates succumb. . ."

   3. Followed by for. Often expressing wider contextual motivations, though sometimes indicating direct causes.
      • 1961, Joseph Heller, Catch-22, Simon & Schuster 1999, p. 232:

        Englishmen are dying for England, Americans are dying for America, Germans are dying for Germany, Russians are dying for Russia.

      • 2003, Tara Herivel & Paul Wright (Eds.), Prison Nation, Routledge 2003, p. 187:

        Less than three days later, Johnson lapsed into a coma in his jail cell and died for lack of insulin.

   4. (now rare) Followed by with. Now rare as indicating direct cause.
      • 1600, William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, Act III, Scene 1:

        Therefore let Benedicke like covered fire, / Consume away in sighes, waste inwardly: / It were a better death, to die with mockes, / Which is as bad as die with tickling.

      • 1830, Jospeh Smith, The Book of Mormon, Richards 1854, p. 337:

        And there were some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year was very frequent in the land.

2. (intransitive) To be cut off from family or friends.

   The day our sister eloped, she died to our mother.

3. (intransitive, idiomatic) To become spiritually dead; to lose hope.

   He died a little inside each time she refused to speak to him.

4. (intransitive, idiomatic) To be mortified or shocked by a situation.

   If anyone sees me wearing this ridiculous outfit, I'll die.

5. (intransitive, of a machine) to stop working, to break down.

   My car died in the middle of the freeway this morning.

• (to stop living): bite the dust, buy the farm, check out, cross over, expire, kick the bucket, pass, pass away, pass on, succumb
• See also Wikisaurus:die

• dead
• death

Definition from Wiktionary Content avaible with GNU Free Documentation License

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