accomplish

Etymology

• First attested in the late 14th century.
• From Middle English acomplissen, borrowed from Old French acompliss-, present participle stem of acomplir (Modern French accomplir), from Latin ad + complere (“to fill up, to complete”).
• See also complete, finish.

Pronunciation

• (UK, General New Zealand, General Australian) IPA^(key): /əˈkʌm.plɪʃ/, /ə.ˈkɒm.plɪʃ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: a‧ccom‧plish

Verb

accomplish (third-person singular simple present accomplishes, present participle accomplishing, simple past and past participle accomplished)

1. (transitive) To finish successfully.
2. (transitive) To complete, as time or distance.
   • That He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem. - Daniel 9:2
   • He had accomplished half a league or more. - William H. Prescott
3. (transitive) To execute fully; to fulfill; to complete successfully.

   to accomplish a design, an object, a promise

   • This that is written must yet be accomplished in me - Luke 22:37
4. (transitive, archaic) To equip or furnish thoroughly; hence, to complete in acquirements; to render accomplished; to polish.
   • The armorers accomplishing the knights - Shakespeare, Henry V, IV-chorus
   • It [the moon] is fully accomplished for all those ends to which Providence did appoint it. - John Wilkins
   • These qualities . . . go to accomplish a perfect woman. - Charles Cowden Clarke
5. (transitive, obsolete) To gain; to obtain.
   • c. 1591, Shakespeare, William, Henry VI, Part 3, act 3, scene 2, lines 151–152:

     And more unlikely / Than to accomplish twenty golden crowns!

Further reading

• accomplish at OneLook Dictionary Search
• accomplish in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• accomplish in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911