ALLAY

Pronunciation (US): (GB):

I. (verb)

Verb forms

Present simple: I / you / we / they allay ... he / she / it allays

Past simple: allayed

Past participle: allayed

-ing form: allaying

Sense 1

Meaning:

Satisfy (thirst)

Example:

The cold water quenched his thirst

Synonyms:

allay; assuage; quench; slake

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

Hypernyms (to "allay" is one way to...):

conform to; fill; fit; fulfil; fulfill; meet; satisfy (fill, satisfy or meet a want or need or condtion ro restriction)

"Allay" entails doing...:

consume; have; ingest; take; take in (serve oneself to, or consume regularly)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Sense 2

Meaning:

Lessen the intensity of or calm

Example:

still the fears

Synonyms:

allay; ease; relieve; still

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Hypernyms (to "allay" is one way to...):

comfort; console; solace; soothe (give moral or emotional strength to)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "allay"):

abreact (discharge bad feelings or tension through verbalization)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Sentence example:

The good news will allay her

Derivation:

allayer (a person who reduces the intensity (e.g., of fears) and calms and pacifies)

Credits

Context examples:

Oh, for but a crust! for but one mouthful to allay the pang of famine!

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

One of them added that it was hard lines that there wasn't any gentleman such-like as yourself, squire, to show some sort of appreciation of their efforts in a liquid form; another put in a rider that the thirst then generated was such that even the time which had elapsed had not completely allayed it.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

I have heard to-night similar, but even more offensive, sentiments from the person who has just sat down, and though it is a conscious effort of self-effacement to come down to that person's mental level, I will endeavor to do so, in order to allay any reasonable doubt which could possibly exist in the minds of anyone.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

On my affording an opportunity, through the medium of the currency of the realm, of the allaying, at a later period, this beneficial evil, one of the men remarked:—That 'ere 'ouse, guv'nor, is the rummiest I ever was in.