famish

English

Etymology

From Middle English famisshe, from famen (“starve”), from Old French afamer, ultimately from Latin famēs (“hunger”). Compare affamish, famine. Cognate with Spanish hambre (“hunger”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈfamɪʃ/

• Audio (Southern England)

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Verb

famish (third-person singular simple present famishes, present participle famishing, simple past and past participle famished)

1. (obsolete, transitive) To starve (to death); to kill or destroy with hunger.
   • c. 1588–1593 (date written), [William Shakespeare], The Most Lamentable Romaine Tragedie of Titus Andronicus: […] (First Quarto), London: […] Iohn Danter, and are to be sold by Edward White & Thomas Millington, […], published 1594, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]:

     Some ſay that Rauens foſter forlorne children, / The whilſt their owne birds famiſh in their neſts: / Oh be to me though thy hard hart ſay no, / Nothing ſo kinde but ſomething pittiful.

   • 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition I, section IV, member 1:

     Even so did Corellius Rufus, another grave senator, by the relation of Plinius Secundus, Epist. lib.1, epist.12, famish himself to death […]

2. (transitive) To exhaust the strength or endurance of, by hunger; to cause to be very hungry.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Genesis 41:55:

     And when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread.

   • 1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

     The pains of famished Tantalus [he] shall feel.

3. (transitive) To kill, or to cause great suffering to, by depriving or denying anything necessary.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book XII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC:

     And famish him of breath, if not of bread?

4. (transitive) To force, control, or constrain by famine.
   • 1790 November, Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, and on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London Relative to that Event. […], London: […] J[ames] Dodsley, […], →OCLC:

     He had […] famished Paris into a surrender.

5. (intransitive) To die of hunger; to starve to death.
6. (intransitive) To suffer extreme hunger or thirst, so as to be exhausted in strength, or to nearly perish.
   • c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:

     You are all resolved rather to die than to famish?

7. (intransitive) To suffer extremity from deprivation of anything essential or necessary.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Proverbs 10:3:

     The Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish.

Derived terms

• famisher
• famishment

Translations

To suffer extreme hunger

• Bulgarian: гладувам (bg) (gladuvam)

References

• “famish”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.