Petrify

4 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Petrify \Pet"ri*fy\ (p[e^]t"r[i^]*f[imac]), v. t. [imp. & p. p.
     {Petrified}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Petrifying}.] [L. petra rock,
     Gr. pe`tra (akin to pe`tros a stone) + -fy: cf. F.
     p['e]trifier. Cf. {Parrot}, {Petrel}, {Pier}.]
     1. To convert, as any animal or vegetable matter, into stone
        or stony substance; as, petrified wood.


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              A river that petrifies any sort of wood or leaves.
                                                    --Kirwan.
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     2. To make callous or obdurate; to transform, as by
        petrifaction; as, to petrify the heart. Young. "Petrifying
        accuracy." --Sir W. Scott.
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              And petrify a genius to a dunce.      --Pope.
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              A hideous fatalism, which ought, logically, to
              petrify your volition.                --G. Eliot.
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     3. To paralyze, especially with fear; to stupefy; as, she was
        petrified by the sight of the bear in her tent.
        [PJC]
  
              The poor, petrified journeyman, quite unconscious of
              what he was doing.                    --De Quincey.
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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Petrify \Pet"ri*fy\, v. i.
     1. To become stone, or of a stony hardness, as organic matter
        by calcareous deposits.
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     2. Fig.: To become stony, callous, or obdurate.
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              Like Niobe we marble grow,
              And petrify with grief.               --Dryden.
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From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  petrify
       v 1: cause to become stone-like or stiff or dazed and stunned;
            "The horror petrified his feelings"; "Fear petrified her
            thinking"
       2: change into stone; "the wood petrified with time" [syn: {lapidify}]
       3: make rigid and set into a conventional pattern; "rigidify
          the training schedule"; "ossified teaching methods";
          "slogans petrify our thinking" [syn: {rigidify}, {ossify}]
       [also: {petrified}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  62 Moby Thesaurus words for "petrify":
     alarm, amaze, anneal, appall, astonish, astound, awe, awestrike,
     bedaze, bedazzle, bemuse, benumb, bewilder, boggle, bowl down,
     bowl over, calcify, callous, case harden, confound, cornify,
     crystallize, daze, dazzle, disconcert, dismay, dumbfound,
     dumbfounder, firm, flabbergast, fossilize, freeze, frighten,
     harden, horrify, indurate, lapidify, lithify, numb, ossify,
     overwhelm, paralyze, perplex, scare, scare stiff, scare to death,
     shock, stagger, startle, steel, strike dead, strike dumb,
     strike terror into, strike with wonder, stun, stupefy, surprise,
     temper, terrify, toughen, turn to stone, vitrify