imbibe
/ɪmˈbaɪb/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: 2.32 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To drink (used frequently of alcoholic beverages).
Example Sentences
- "Perhaps in the case of the vodka-drinking peasant it is this weekly parboil which saves his life and postpones the dreadful day when the constant imbibing of unlimited quantities of the deadly liquor must be paid for."
- "Without its sting, the common yellowjacket would be unable to steal ham from our sandwich or imbibe the sweet juice from our peach."
- "to imbibe knowledge"
- "“Every minute,” continued M. Krempe with warmth, “every instant that you have wasted on those books is utterly and entirely lost. You have burdened your memory with exploded systems, and useless names. Good God! in what desert land have you lived, where no one was kind enough to inform you that these fancies, which you have so greedily imbibed, are a thousand years old, and as musty as they are ancient? I little expected in this enlightened and scientific age to find a disciple of Albertus Magnus and Paracelsus. My dear Sir, you must begin your studies entirely anew.”"
- "To eradicate that error, already but too deeply imbibed, to subdue and triumph over human infirmity, was indeed difficult, but to Rosilia a derogation from virtue was still more so."
- "Like the late Dr Falk (d. 1782), Grabianka was a native of Podolia, where Sabbatian influences were strong among local Jews, and he imbibed many of their notions."
Etymology
From Middle English imbiben, from Latin imbibō, from im- + bibō (“to drink”) (whence also beverage), from Proto-Italic *pibō, from Proto-Indo-European *peh₃-, whence also potable, potion.