suffocate

English

Etymology

From Latin suffocatus, past participle of suffocare (“to choke, stifle”), from sub (“under”) + faux (“the upper part of the throat, the pharynx”).

Verb

suffocate (third-person singular simple present suffocates, present participle suffocating, simple past and past participle suffocated)

  1. (ergative) To suffer, or cause someone to suffer, from severely reduced oxygen intake to the body.
    Open the hatch, he is suffocating in the airlock!
  2. (ergative) To die due to, or kill someone by means of, insufficient oxygen supply to the body.
    He suffocated his wife by holding a pillow over her head.
    • Shakespeare
      Let not hemp his windpipe suffocate.
  3. (ergative, figuratively) To overwhelm, or be overwhelmed (by a person or issue), as though with oxygen deprivation.
    I'm suffocating under this huge workload.
  4. (transitive) To destroy; to extinguish.
    to suffocate fire

Synonyms

Derived terms

Translations

(intransitive) to suffer from severely reduced oxygen intake to the body
(intransitive) to die due to insufficient oxygen supply to the body
(transitive) to cause someone to suffer severely reduced oxygen supply to his body
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.

Adjective

suffocate (comparative more suffocate, superlative most suffocate)

  1. (obsolete) Suffocated; choked.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of Shakespeare to this entry?)

Further reading

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

Anagrams

Latin

Verb

suffōcāte

  1. second-person plural present active imperative of suffōcō
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