Link Centre Dictionary

consume

con·sume

UK/kənˈsjuːm/ US/kənˈʃuːm/ fairly common

verb

1.

eat immoderately

  • “Some people can down a pound of meat in the course of one meal”
Synonyms
2.

serve oneself to, or consume regularly

  • “Have another bowl of chicken soup!”
  • “I don”
Synonyms
Antonyms
3.

spend extravagantly

  • “waste not, want not”
Synonyms
4.

destroy completely

  • “The fire consumed the building”
5.

use up (resources or materials)

  • “this car consumes a lot of gas”
  • “We exhausted our savings”
  • “They run through 20 bottles of wine a week”
Synonyms
6.

engage fully

  • “The effort to pass the exam consumed all his energy”

Origin

From Middle English consumen, from Old French consumer, from Latin cōnsūmere, cōnsūmō, from con- (“with, together”) + sūmō (“take; consume”), from sub- + emō (“to buy, take”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₁em- (“to take, distribute”), possibly related to the root *nem- (“to take or give one's due”).

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Related verbs

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.