sift
Appearance
See also: SIFT
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From Middle English syften, from Old English siftan, from Proto-West Germanic *siftijan.
Pronunciation
[edit]Verb
[edit]sift (third-person singular simple present sifts, present participle sifting, simple past and past participle sifted)
- To sieve or strain (something).
- To separate or scatter (things) as if by sieving.
- To examine (something) carefully.
- (archaic or dated) To scrutinise (someone or something) carefully so as to find the truth.
- 1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The life and death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], page 23, column 1:
- As neere as I could ſift him on that argument,
On ſome apparant danger ſeene in him,
Aym‘d at your Highneſſe, no inueterate malice.
- 1748, David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral, London: Oxford University Press, published 1973, § 28:
- But if we still carry on our sifting humour, and ask, What is the foundation of all conclusions from experience ? this implies a new question.
- 1764, Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto, Strawberry Hill Press:
- It immediately occurred to him to sift her on the subject of Isabella and Theodore.
- [with through] To carefully go through a set of objects, or a collection of information, in order to find something.
- 1996, Timothy B. Savage, Power Through Weakness: Paul's Understanding of the Christian Ministry in 2 Corinthians, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, page 70:
- Sifting through the work of great orators like Philostratus and Quintilian they identify numerous examples of classical irony, metaphor, comparison, etc. which are missing in Paul.
- (archaic or dated) To scrutinise (someone or something) carefully so as to find the truth.
- (computing, dated) To move data records up in memory to make space to insert further records.
Derived terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]to sieve or strain (something)
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to separate or scatter (things) as if by sieving
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to examine (something) carefully
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Noun
[edit]sift (plural sifts)
- An act of sifting.
Usage notes
[edit]The utensil used for sifting is a sieve, not a "sift".
Anagrams
[edit]Categories:
- English terms inherited from Middle English
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms inherited from Old English
- English terms derived from Old English
- English terms inherited from Proto-West Germanic
- English terms derived from Proto-West Germanic
- English 1-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio pronunciation
- Rhymes:English/ɪft
- Rhymes:English/ɪft/1 syllable
- English lemmas
- English verbs
- English terms with archaic senses
- English dated terms
- English terms with quotations
- en:Computing
- English nouns
- English countable nouns