surfeit

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WOTD – 20 July 2007    

Contents

English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Old French surfaire (“to augment, exaggerate, exceed”), from sur- + faire (“to do”).

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

surfeit (countable and uncountable; plural surfeits)

  1. (countable) An excessive amount of something.
    A surfeit of wheat is driving down the price.
  2. (uncountable) Overindulgence in either food or drink; overeating.
  3. (countable) A sickness or condition caused by overindulgence.
    King Henry I is said to have died of a surfeit of lampreys.

Quotations[edit]

Synonyms[edit]

Translations[edit]

an excessive amount of something
overindulgence in either food or drink; overeating
a sickness or condition caused by overindulgence

Verb[edit]

surfeit (third-person singular simple present surfeits, present participle surfeiting, simple past and past participle surfeited)

  1. (transitive) To fill to excess.
    • 1610, The Tempest, by Shakespeare, act 3 scene 3
      You are three men of sin, whom Destiny,
      That hath to instrument this lower world
      And what is in't,—the never-surfeited sea
      Hath caused to belch up you;
  2. (transitive) To feed someone to excess.
    She surfeited her children on sweets.
  3. (intransitive, reflexive) To overeat or feed to excess.
    • 1906, O. Henry, The Furnished Room
      To the door of this, the twelfth house whose bell he had rung, came a housekeeper who made him think of an unwholesome, surfeited worm that had eaten its nut to a hollow shell and now sought to fill the vacancy with edible lodgers.
  4. (intransitive, reflexive) To sicken from overindulgence.

Synonyms[edit]

Translations[edit]

to fill to excess
to feed someone to excess
to overeat or feed to excess
to sicken from overindulgence

Related terms[edit]

External links[edit]

Anagrams[edit]

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