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love
[ luhv ]
noun
- a strong feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, such as for a parent, child, friend, or pet:
He bent and kissed his newborn daughter on the brow, his heart full of love and gratitude.
Synonyms: friendliness, regard, inclination, liking
- a profoundly tender, passionate affection, often mingled with sexual desire, for another person:
The couple’s ardent love for each other, poured out in these love letters, survived their wartime separation.
Synonyms: tenderness, adoration, passion, warmth, predilection, fondness
- sexual passion or desire.
- active, self-giving concern for the well-being of others:
Love of one's neighbor is the greatest virtue.
What this suffering world needs is more love.
- a person toward whom love is felt; beloved person; sweetheart:
I long to be with you, my love.
He was my first and only love.
- (used as a term of endearment, affection, or the like):
Would you like to see a movie, love?
- a love affair; an intensely amorous incident; amour:
It's the story of her many loves, told through the eyes of a journalist.
- Love, a personification of sexual affection, as Eros or Cupid.
- strong enthusiasm or liking for anything:
His huge personal library testified to his love of books.
- a thing for which one has a strong enthusiasm or liking:
The theater was her great love.
- Religion. the benevolent affection and deep compassion of God for all creatures, or the reverent devotion returned from them to God.
- Chiefly Tennis. a score of zero; nothing.
- a word formerly used in communications to represent the letter L.
verb (used with object)
- to have a warm personal attachment to or deep affection for:
All her students love her.
I fuss over you, I know, but I love you and I want you to be safe.
Synonyms: like
- to have a profoundly tender, passionate affection, often mingled with sexual desire, for (another person).
- to feel a strong liking for or take great pleasure in; enjoy actively and with enthusiasm:
I love music.
He's loving his new job.
- to feel or show active, self-giving concern for:
Love your neighbor—even the one you don’t like.
- to feel or express reverent devotion toward; adore.
- to need or require; benefit greatly from:
Plants love sunlight.
- to have sexual intercourse with.
- to embrace and kiss (someone), as a lover.
verb (used without object)
- to have love or affection for another person; be in love:
Those who have never loved will not understand what I am saying.
verb phrase
- to hug and cuddle:
She loves that little guy up every chance she gets.
love
/ lʌv /
verb
- tr to have a great attachment to and affection for
- tr to have passionate desire, longing, and feelings for
- tr to like or desire (to do something) very much
- tr to make love to
- intr to be in love
noun
- an intense emotion of affection, warmth, fondness, and regard towards a person or thing
- ( as modifier )
love song
love story
- a deep feeling of sexual attraction and desire
- wholehearted liking for or pleasure in something
- Christianity
- God's benevolent attitude towards man
- man's attitude of reverent devotion towards God
- Alsomy love a beloved person: used esp as an endearment
- informal.a term of address, esp but not necessarily for a person regarded as likable
- (in tennis, squash, etc) a score of zero
- fall in loveto become in love
- for lovewithout payment
- for love or moneyused with a negative in any circumstances
I wouldn't eat a snail for love or money
- for the love offor the sake of
- in lovein a state of strong emotional attachment and usually sexual attraction
- make love
- to have sexual intercourse (with)
- to engage in courtship (with)
Other Words From
- out·love verb (used with object) outloved outloving
- o·ver·love verb overloved overloving
Word History and Origins
Origin of love1
Word History and Origins
Origin of love1
Idioms and Phrases
- for love,
- out of devotion, affection, liking, or enjoyment.
- without compensation:
He volunteered at the animal shelter for love.
- for the love of, in consideration of; for the sake of:
For the love of mercy, stop that noise!
- in love with, feeling deep affection or passion for (a person, idea, occupation, etc.); enamored of:
I was in love with the girl next door.
Anyone spending that many hours here without pay must be in love with their work!
- in love, infused with or feeling deep affection or passion:
He was a youth always in love.
- make love,
- to engage in sexual activity.
- to embrace and kiss as lovers.
There was no love lost between the two brothers.
More idioms and phrases containing love
- all's fair in love and war
- course of true love
- fall in love
- for the love of
- labor of love
- make love
- misery loves company
- no love lost
- not for love or money
- puppy love
- somebody up there loves me
Example Sentences
What happened to true love knows no boundaries and all that?
“I love my job and I love my city and I am committed to the work here,” he said in a statement.
And we have a lot of great guests this season: Greta Gerwig, Natasha Lyonne, Olivia Wilde, Steve Buscemi is back—I love that guy.
You just travel light with carry-on luggage, go to cities that you love, and get to hang out with all your friends.
Terrorism is bad news anywhere, but especially rough on Odessa, where the city motto seems to be “make love, not war.”
In this case, I suspect, there was co-operant a strongly marked childish characteristic, the love of producing an effect.
The well-known "cock and bull" stories of small children are inspired by this love of strong effect.
Women generally consider consequences in love, seldom in resentment.
And as she hesitated between obedience to one and duty toward the other, her life, her love and future was in the balance.
Nothing but an extreme love of truth could have hindered me from concealing this part of my story.
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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