Adjacent Words

Breed definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

BREED, v.t. pret. and pp. bred.
1. To generate; to engender; to hatch; to produce the young of any species of animals. I think it is never used of plants, and in animals is always applied to the mother or dam.
2. To produce within or upon the body; as, to breed teeth; to breed worms.
3. To cause; to occasion; to produce; to originate.
Intemperance and lust breed infirmities.
Ambition breeds factions.
4. To contrive; to hatch; to produce by plotting.
Had he a heart and a brain to breed it in?
5. To give birth to; to be the native place of; as, a pond breeds fish; a northern country breeds a race of stout men.
6. To educate; to instruct; to form by education; often, but unnecessarily, followed by up; as, to breed a son to an occupation; a man bred at a university. To breed up is vulgar.
7. To bring up; to nurse and foster; to take care of in infancy, and through the age of youth; to provide for, train and conduct; to instruct the mind and form the manners in youth.
To bring thee forth with pain, with care to breed.
BREED, v.i. To produce, as a fetus; to bear and nourish, as in pregnancy; as, a female breeds with pain.
1. To be formed in the parent or dam; to be generated, or to grow, as young before birth; as,children or young breed in the matrix.
2. To have birth; to be produced; as, fish breed in rivers.
3. To be increased by a new production.
But could youth last and love still breed.
4. To raise a breed; as, to choose the best species of swine to breed from.
BREED, n. A race or progeny from the same parents or stock.
1. A cast; a kind; a race of men or other animals, which have an alliance by nativity, or some distinctive qualities in common; as a breed of men in a particular country; a breed of horses or sheep. Applied to men, it is not elegant. We use race.
2. Progeny; offspring; applied to other things than animals.
3. A number produced at once, a hatch; a brood; but for this, brood is generally used.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: a special variety of domesticated animals within a species; "he experimented on a particular breed of white rats"; "he created a new strain of sheep" [syn: breed, strain, stock]
2: a special type; "Google represents a new breed of entrepreneurs" v
1: call forth [syn: engender, breed, spawn]
2: copulate with a female, used especially of horses; "The horse covers the mare" [syn: breed, cover]
3: cause to procreate (animals); "She breeds dogs"
4: have young (animals) or reproduce (organisms); "pandas rarely breed in captivity"; "These bacteria reproduce" [syn: breed, multiply]

Merriam Webster's

I. verb (bred; breeding) Etymology: Middle English breden, from Old English br?dan; akin to Old English br?d brood Date: before 12th century transitive verb 1. to produce (offspring) by hatching or gestation 2. a. beget 1 b. produce, engender <despair often breeds violence> 3. to propagate (plants or animals) sexually and usually under controlled conditions <bred several strains of corn together to produce a superior variety> 4. a. bring up, nurture <born and bred in the country> b. to inculcate by training <breed good manners into one's children> 5. a. mate IV,3 b. to mate with ; inseminate c. impregnate 2 6. to produce (a fissionable element) by bombarding a nonfissionable element with neutrons from a radioactive element intransitive verb 1. a. to produce offspring by sexual union b. copulate, mate 2. to propagate animals or plants II. noun Date: 1553 1. a group of usually domesticated animals or plants presumably related by descent from common ancestors and visibly similar in most characters 2. a number of persons of the same stock 3. class, kind <a new breed of athlete>

Oxford Reference Dictionary

v. & n. --v. (past and past part. bred) 1 tr. & intr. bear, generate (offspring). 2 tr. & intr. propagate or cause to propagate; raise (livestock). 3 tr. a yield, produce; result in (war breeds famine). b spread (discontent bred by rumour). 4 intr. arise; spread (disease breeds in the Tropics). 5 tr. bring up; train (bred to the law; Hollywood breeds stars). 6 tr. Physics create (fissile material) by nuclear reaction. --n. 1 a stock of animals or plants within a species, having a similar appearance, and usu. developed by deliberate selection. 2 a race; a lineage. 3 a sort, a kind. Phrases and idioms: bred and born = born and bred. bred in the bone hereditary. breeder reactor a nuclear reactor that can create more fissile material than it consumes. breed in mate with or marry near relations. Derivatives: breeder n. Etymology: OE bredan: rel. to BROOD

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Breed Breed, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Bred; p. pr. & vb. n. Breeding.] [OE. breden, AS. br[=e]dan to nourish, cherish, keep warm, from br[=o]d brood; akin to D. broeden to brood, OHG. bruoten, G. br["u]ten. See Brood.] 1. To produce as offspring; to bring forth; to bear; to procreate; to generate; to beget; to hatch. Yet every mother breeds not sons alike. --Shak. If the sun breed maggots in a dead dog. --Shak. 2. To take care of in infancy, and through the age of youth; to bring up; to nurse and foster. To bring thee forth with pain, with care to breed. --Dryden. Born and bred on the verge of the wilderness. --Everett. 3. To educate; to instruct; to form by education; to train; -- sometimes followed by up. But no care was taken to breed him a Protestant. --Bp. Burnet. His farm may not remove his children too far from him, or the trade he breeds them up in. --Locke. 4. To engender; to cause; to occasion; to originate; to produce; as, to breed a storm; to breed disease. Lest the place And my quaint habits breed astonishment. --Milton. 5. To give birth to; to be the native place of; as, a pond breeds fish; a northern country breeds stout men. 6. To raise, as any kind of stock. 7. To produce or obtain by any natural process. [Obs.] Children would breed their teeth with less danger. --Locke. Syn: To engender; generate; beget; produce; hatch; originate; bring up; nourish; train; instruct.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Breed Breed, n. 1. A race or variety of men or other animals (or of plants), perpetuating its special or distinctive characteristics by inheritance. Twice fifteen thousand hearts of England's breed. --Shak. Greyhounds of the best breed. --Carpenter. 2. Class; sort; kind; -- of men, things, or qualities. Are these the breed of wits so wondered at? --Shak. This courtesy is not of the right breed. --Shak. 3. A number produced at once; a brood. [Obs.] Note: Breed is usually applied to domestic animals; species or variety to wild animals and to plants; and race to men.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Breed Breed, v. i. 1. To bear and nourish young; to reproduce or multiply itself; to be pregnant. That they breed abundantly in the earth. --Gen. viii. 17. The mother had never bred before. --Carpenter. Ant. Is your gold and silver ewes and rams? Shy. I can not tell. I make it breed as fast. --Shak. 2. To be formed in the parent or dam; to be generated, or to grow, as young before birth. 3. To have birth; to be produced or multiplied. Heavens rain grace On that which breeds between them. --Shak. 4. To raise a breed; to get progeny. The kind of animal which you wish to breed from. --Gardner. To breed in and in, to breed from animals of the same stock that are closely related.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(breeds, breeding, bred) Frequency: The word is one of the 3000 most common words in English. 1. A breed of a pet animal or farm animal is a particular type of it. For example, terriers are a breed of dog. ...rare breeds of cattle... Certain breeds are more dangerous than others. N-COUNT 2. If you breed animals or plants, you keep them for the purpose of producing more animals or plants with particular qualities, in a controlled way. He lived alone, breeding horses and dogs... These dogs are bred to fight. VERB: V n, be V-ed to-inf see also cross-breed • breeding There is potential for selective breeding for better yields. N-UNCOUNT 3. When animals breed, they have babies. Frogs will usually breed in any convenient pond... The area now attracts over 60 species of breeding birds. VERB: V, V-ing • breeding During the breeding season the birds come ashore. N-UNCOUNT: oft N n 4. If you say that something breeds bad feeling or bad behaviour, you mean that it causes bad feeling or bad behaviour to develop. If they are unemployed it's bound to breed resentment... Violence breeds violence. = create VERB: V n, V n 5. You can refer to someone or something as one of a particular breed of person or thing when you want to talk about what they are like. Sue is one of the new breed of British women squash players who are making a real impact... The new breed of walking holidays puts the emphasis on enjoyment, not endurance... = strain N-COUNT: usu sing, with supp 6. see also breeding, ill-bred, pure-bred, well-bred 7. Someone who was born and bred in a place was born there and grew up there. I was born and bred in the highlands... PHRASE 8. familiarity breeds contempt: see familiarity

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

bred: Found in the past tense in Ex 16:20 as a translation of rum = "to bring up," "to rise." In this verse, the manna is said to have arisen, i.e. "become alive" (with worms), to indicate that God's gifts are spoiled by selfish and miserly hoarding. The pres. act. occurs in Ge 8:17 for sharats = "to wriggle," "swarm," "abound," hence, "breed abundantly"; and in De 32:14 for ben = "son," "descendant," "child," "colt," "calf," "breed." The present participle is found in Ze 2:9 the King James Version for mimshaq, a derivative of mesheq = "possession," "territory," "field." The passage in question should therefore be translated "field of nettles" (the Revised Version (British and American) "possession of nettles").

Frank E. Hirsch

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

I. v. a. 1. Bring forth, bear, conceive and bring to birth, beget, produce, engender. 2. Nourish, nurture, foster, bring up, rear, raise. 3. Discipline, educate, instruct, train, teach, school, bring up, nurture, rear. 4. Originate, occasion, beget, produce, engender, generate, be the occasion of, give rise to, be the cause of. II. v. n. 1. Bring forth young, produce off-spring. 2. Be born, be produced, have birth, arise, take rise, grow, develop. 3. Raise live-stock, engage in breeding. III. n. Race (of animals), lineage, pedigree, progeny, stock, family, line, extraction, strain.

Moby Thesaurus

accrue, accumulate, advance, affiliation, animal kingdom, apparentation, appear, appreciate, apprentice, arise, author, balloon, be gravid, be knocked up, be pregnant, be with child, bear, beget, birth, bloat, blood, bloodline, boom, branch, brand, break, break in, breed true, bring about, bring forth, bring into being, bring to effect, bring to pass, bring up, broaden, brood, call into being, carry, carry young, cast, cause, character, children, clan, class, coin, color, common ancestry, conceive, concoct, condition, consanguinity, contrive, cook up, copulate, cover, create, crescendo, crossbreed, cultivate, culture, deme, denomination, derivation, descendants, descent, description, design, designation, develop, devise, direct line, discipline, discover, distaff side, do, dream up, drill, effect, effectuate, engender, establish, evolve, exercise, extraction, fabricate, family, farm, father, fatten, feather, feed, female line, fetch up, filiation, fit, folk, form, foster, found, frame, fruit, gain, gain strength, generate, genre, gens, genus, gestate, get, get ahead, get up, give being to, give birth to, give occasion to, give origin to, give rise to, go up, grain, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, groom, grow, hatch, heirs, hostages to fortune, house, house-train, housebreak, ilk, improve, improvise, inaugurate, inbreed, increase, incubate, induce, inheritors, institute, intensify, invent, issue, keep, kidney, kids, kin, kind, label, lick into shape, line, line of descent, lineage, little ones, lot, make, make do with, make love, make up, male line, manner, mark, matriclan, mature, mint, mold, mother, mount, multiply, muster up, nation, nature, new generation, number, nurse, nurture, occasion, offspring, order, originate, outbreed, patriclan, people, persuasion, phratry, phyle, phylum, plan, plant kingdom, posterity, practice, prepare, procreate, produce, progenerate, progeny, proliferate, propagate, put in tune, put to school, race, raise, ranch, ready, realize, rear, rehearse, reproduce, reproduce in kind, rise, rising generation, run, run up, seed, send to school, sept, set, set afloat, set on foot, set up, shape, shoot up, side, sire, sit, snowball, sons, sort, spawn, spear side, species, spindle side, spread, stamp, stem, stirps, stock, strain, strengthen, strike out, stripe, style, succession, swell, sword side, take in hand, the like of, the likes of, think out, think up, totem, train, treasures, tribe, type, variety, wax, widen, work, work up, younglings, youngsters