Library / English Dictionary

INSCRIBE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Address, (a work of literature) in a style less formal than a dedication

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

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

dedicate (inscribe or address by way of compliment)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something to somebody

Sense 2

Meaning:

Convert ordinary language into code

Example:

We should encode the message for security reasons

Synonyms:

cipher; code; cypher; encipher; encrypt; inscribe; write in code

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

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

encode (convert information into code)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 3

Meaning:

Mark with one's signature

Example:

The author autographed his book

Synonyms:

autograph; inscribe

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

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

sign (be engaged by a written agreement)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 4

Meaning:

Write, engrave, or print as a lasting record

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

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

enter; put down; record (make a record of; set down in permanent form)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

inscription (the activity of inscribing (especially carving or engraving) letters or words)

Sense 5

Meaning:

Carve, cut, or etch into a material or surface

Example:

the lovers scratched their names into the bark of the tree

Synonyms:

engrave; grave; inscribe; scratch

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

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

carve; chip at (engrave or cut by chipping away at a surface)

Verb group:

engrave; etch (carve or cut a design or letters into)

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

character (engrave or inscribe characters on)

Sentence frames:

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

Sense 6

Meaning:

Draw within a figure so as to touch in as many places as possible

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

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

delineate; describe; draw; line; trace (make a mark or lines on a surface)

Domain category:

geometry (the pure mathematics of points and lines and curves and surfaces)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sense 7

Meaning:

Register formally as a participant or member

Example:

The party recruited many new members

Synonyms:

enrol; enroll; enter; inscribe; recruit

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

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

register (record in writing; enter into a book of names or events or transactions)

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

draft; enlist; muster in (engage somebody to enter the army)

unionise; unionize (recruit for a union or organize into a union)

register (enroll to vote)

matriculate (enroll as a student)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s somebody
Somebody ----s PP

Credits

 Context examples: 

Inscribed upon it, in the jagged handwriting of Professor Challenger, were the words:—

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Some future traveller, visiting, from motives of curiosity, not unmingled, let us hope, with sympathy, the place of confinement allotted to debtors in this city, may, and I trust will, Ponder, as he traces on its wall, inscribed with a rusty nail,

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I cannot tell what sentiment haunted the quite solitary churchyard, with its inscribed headstone; its gate, its two trees, its low horizon, girdled by a broken wall, and its newly-risen crescent, attesting the hour of eventide.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)