Library / English Dictionary

QUENCH

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Cool (hot metal) by plunging into cold water or other liquid

Example:

quench steel

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

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

chill; cool; cool down (make cool or cooler)

Sentence frames:

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

Sense 2

Meaning:

Reduce the degree of (luminescence or phosphorescence) in (excited molecules or a material) by adding a suitable substance

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

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

bring down; cut; cut back; cut down; reduce; trim; trim back; trim down (cut down on; make a reduction in)

Domain category:

natural philosophy; physics (the science of matter and energy and their interactions)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 3

Meaning:

Suppress or crush completely

Example:

quench a rebellion

Synonyms:

quell; quench; squelch

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

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

conquer; stamp down; subdue; suppress (bring under control by force or authority)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 4

Meaning:

Satisfy (thirst)

Example:

The cold water quenched his thirst

Synonyms:

allay; assuage; quench; slake

Classified under:

Verbs of eating and drinking

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

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

"Quench" entails doing...:

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

Sentence frames:

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

Sense 5

Meaning:

Electronics: suppress (sparking) when the current is cut off in an inductive circuit, or suppress (an oscillation or discharge) in a component or device

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

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

conquer; stamp down; subdue; suppress (bring under control by force or authority)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 6

Meaning:

Put out, as of fires, flames, or lights

Example:

snuff out the candles

Synonyms:

blow out; extinguish; quench; snuff out

Classified under:

Verbs of raining, snowing, thawing, thundering

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

stub (extinguish by crushing)

douse; put out (put out, as of a candle or a light)

black out (obliterate or extinguish)

Sentence frames:

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

Derivation:

quenching (the act of extinguishing; causing to stop burning)

Credits

 Context examples: 

"No, sir," I answered; "but there has been a fire: get up, do; you are quenched now; I will fetch you a candle."

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

He has a temper, not like ours—one flash and then all over—but the white, still anger that is seldom stirred, but once kindled is hard to quench.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Now I'll quench the curiosity of this little Fatima, my dear Daisy, by leaving her nothing to guess at.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

His fine and lovely eyes were now lighted up with indignation, now subdued to downcast sorrow and quenched in infinite wretchedness.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Dummling asked him what he was taking to heart so sorely, and he answered: I have such a great thirst and cannot quench it; cold water I cannot stand, a barrel of wine I have just emptied, but that to me is like a drop on a hot stone!

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

I desired you would let me know, by a letter, when party and faction were extinguished; judges learned and upright; pleaders honest and modest, with some tincture of common sense, and Smithfield blazing with pyramids of law books; the young nobility’s education entirely changed; the physicians banished; the female Yahoos abounding in virtue, honour, truth, and good sense; courts and levees of great ministers thoroughly weeded and swept; wit, merit, and learning rewarded; all disgracers of the press in prose and verse condemned to eat nothing but their own cotton, and quench their thirst with their own ink.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

His countenance reminded one of a lamp quenched, waiting to be re-lit—and alas! it was not himself that could now kindle the lustre of animated expression: he was dependent on another for that office!

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Her efforts in this line, however, were brought to an abrupt close by an untoward accident, which quenched her ardor.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

The way in which I listened to all the incidents of the house that made themselves audible to me; the ringing of bells, the opening and shutting of doors, the murmuring of voices, the footsteps on the stairs; to any laughing, whistling, or singing, outside, which seemed more dismal than anything else to me in my solitude and disgrace—the uncertain pace of the hours, especially at night, when I would wake thinking it was morning, and find that the family were not yet gone to bed, and that all the length of night had yet to come—the depressed dreams and nightmares I had—the return of day, noon, afternoon, evening, when the boys played in the churchyard, and I watched them from a distance within the room, being ashamed to show myself at the window lest they should know I was a prisoner—the strange sensation of never hearing myself speak—the fleeting intervals of something like cheerfulness, which came with eating and drinking, and went away with it—the setting in of rain one evening, with a fresh smell, and its coming down faster and faster between me and the church, until it and gathering night seemed to quench me in gloom, and fear, and remorse—all this appears to have gone round and round for years instead of days, it is so vividly and strongly stamped on my remembrance.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Only master had been reading in his bed last night; he fell asleep with his candle lit, and the curtains got on fire; but, fortunately, he awoke before the bed-clothes or the wood-work caught, and contrived to quench the flames with the water in the ewer.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)