amend

See also: amend.

English

Wikipedia

Etymology

From Old French amender, from Latin ēmendō ‎(“free from faults”), from ex ‎(“from, out of”) + mendum ‎(“fault”). Confer aphetic mend.

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /əˈmɛnd/
• Rhymes: -ɛnd

Verb

amend ‎(third-person singular simple present amends, present participle amending, simple past and past participle amended)

1. (transitive) To make better.
   • 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 1, in The Celebrity:

     I was about to say that I had known the Celebrity from the time he wore kilts. But I see I will have to amend that, because he was not a celebrity then, nor, indeed, did he achieve fame until some time after I left New York for the West.

   • Shakespeare

     Mar not the thing that cannot be amended.

   • Sir Walter Scott

     We shall cheer her sorrows, and amend her blood, by wedding her to a Norman.

2. (intransitive) To become better.
3. (obsolete, transitive) To heal (someone sick); to cure (a disease etc.).
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.x:

     But Paridell complaynd, that his late fight / With Britomart, so sore did him offend, / That ryde he could not, till his hurts he did amend.

   • 1621, Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, II.2.6.ii:

     he gave her a vomit, and conveyed a serpent, such as she conceived, into the basin; upon the sight of it she was amended.

4. (transitive) To make a formal alteration in legislation by adding, deleting, or rephrasing.

Synonyms

The terms below need to be checked and allocated to the definitions (senses) of the headword above. Each term should appear in the sense for which it is appropriate. Use the template {{sense|"gloss"}}, substituting a short version of the definition for "gloss".

• ameliorate
• correct
• improve
• See also Wikisaurus:improve
• See also Wikisaurus:repair

Related terms

• mend
• amendment
• amends
• emend

Translations

to make better

• Arabic: حَسَّنَ ‎(ḥassana)
• Bulgarian: поправям (bg) ‎(popravjam), подобрявам (bg) ‎(podobrjavam)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 修正 (zh) ‎(xiūzhèng), 修改 (zh) ‎(xiūgǎi), 改正 (zh) ‎(gǎizhèng)

• Czech: zlepšit (cs), zlepšovat, vylepšit, vylepšovat
• Dutch: verbeteren (nl), corrigeren (nl), aanpassen (nl)
• Finnish: korjata (fi), parantaa (fi)
• French: amender (fr)
• German: verbessern (de), ausbessern (de)
• Irish: leasaigh, ceartaigh

• Japanese: 改正する (ja) ‎(かいせいする, kaisei suru), 改める ‎(あらためる, aratameru), 修正する (ja) ‎(しゅうせいする, shūsei suru)
• Norman: amender
• Maori: haukaha, menemana
• Polish: poprawiać (pl), poprawić (pl)
• Portuguese: melhorar (pt)
• Russian: улучша́ть (ru) impf ‎(ulučšátʹ), соверше́нствовать (ru) impf ‎(soveršénstvovatʹ), исправля́ть (ru) impf ‎(ispravljátʹ)
• Serbo-Croatian: poboljšati (sh)
• Spanish: corregir (es), mejorar (es)
• Turkish: iyileştirmek (tr), düzeltmek (tr)

to become better

• Arabic: حَسُنَ ‎(ḥasuna)
• Czech: zlepšit se, zlepšovat se, napravit se, napravovat se
• Dutch: verbeteren (nl)
• Finnish: korjaantua, parantua (fi)
• German: verbessern (de)

• Polish: poprawić się (pl) pf, poprawiać się (pl) impf
• Portuguese: melhorar (pt)
• Russian: улучша́ться (ru) impf ‎(ulučšátʹsja), соверше́нствоваться (ru) impf ‎(soveršénstvovatʹsja), исправля́ться (ru) impf ‎(ispravljátʹsja)
• Spanish: mejorar (es)
• Turkish: iyileşmek (tr), düzelmek (tr)

to make a formal alteration

• Bulgarian: кориги́рам (bg) ‎(korigíram)
• Czech: napravit, napravovat
• Dutch: amenderen
• Finnish: muuttaa (fi)
• German: novellieren (de)
• Hungarian: helyesbít (hu)
• Irish: leasaigh

• Italian: emendare (it)
• Maori: menemana
• Portuguese: emendar (pt)
• Russian: вноси́ть измене́ния impf ‎(vnosítʹ izmenénija), вноси́ть попра́вки impf ‎(vnosítʹ poprávki)
• Spanish: enmendar (es)
• Swedish: korrigera (sv), redigera (sv), ändra (sv)

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Help:How to check translations.

Translations to be checked

• French: ^{(please verify)} amender (fr)

• Italian: ^{(please verify)} correggere (it)

References

• amend in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• amend in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911

Anagrams

• ad-men, admen, maned, Medan, named