Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A strong feeling of affection and concern toward another person, as that arising from kinship or close friendship.
  • noun A strong feeling of affection and concern for another person accompanied by sexual attraction.
  • noun A feeling of devotion or adoration toward God or a god.
  • noun A feeling of kindness or concern by God or a god toward humans.
  • noun Christianity Charity.
  • noun Sexual desire or activity.
  • noun An instance of being in love.
  • noun A person for whom one has strong feelings of affection.
  • noun Used as a term of endearment for such a person.
  • noun An intense emotional attachment to something, as to a pet or treasured object.
  • noun An expression of one's affection.
  • noun A strong predilection or enthusiasm.
  • noun The object of such an enthusiasm.
  • noun Mythology Eros or Cupid.
  • noun Sports A score of zero, as in tennis.
  • intransitive verb To feel love for (a person).
  • intransitive verb To feel sexual love for (a person).
  • intransitive verb To feel devotion to (God or a god).
  • intransitive verb To feel or show kindness or concern to (a person). Used of God or a god.
  • intransitive verb To have an intense emotional attachment to.
  • intransitive verb To embrace or caress.
  • intransitive verb To have sexual intercourse with.
  • intransitive verb To like or desire enthusiastically.
  • intransitive verb To thrive on; need.
  • intransitive verb To feel love or sexual love for another.
  • idiom (for love) Out of compassion; with no thought for a reward.
  • idiom (for love or money) Under any circumstances. Usually used in negative sentences.
  • idiom (for the love of) For the sake of; in consideration for.
  • idiom (in love) Deeply or passionately enamored.
  • idiom (in love) Highly or immoderately fond.
  • idiom (no love lost) No affection; animosity.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To regard with a strong feeling of affection; hold dear; have a strong regard for.
  • Specifically, to regard (one of the opposite sex) with the admiration and devotion characteristic of the sexual relation; be in love with.
  • To have a strong liking, craving, or appetite for; like; take pleasure in; delight in: followed by a noun or an infinitive.
  • To caress; show affection by caresses: a childish use of the word.
  • To have strong affection; especially, to be passionately attached to one of the opposite sex.
  • noun The principle of sympathetic or pleasurable attraction in sentient and thinking beings; that feeling of predilection or solicitude for, or delight in, certain individuals or classes, principles, qualities, or things, which excites a strong desire or craving for the welfare, companionship, possession, enjoyment, or promotion of its object or objects; the yearning desire (whether right or perverted) for what is thought to be best in any relation or from any point of view.
  • noun Intimate personal affection between individuals of opposite sex capable of intermarriage; the emotional incentive to and normal basis of conjugal union: as, to be in love; to marry for love.
  • noun A beloved person; an object of affectionate interest, as a sweetheart or a husband or wife: often also used in address as a term of endearment.
  • noun [capitalized] A personification of the passion of love; sexual attraction imagined as an independent power external to its subject: applied especially to Cupid (more properly Amor) or Eros, the classical god of love, and more rarely to Venus or Aphrodite, the goddess of love.
  • noun An embodiment or a representation of Cupid; one of a class of beings poetically imagined as devoted to the interests of lovers, and depicted as winged boys.
  • noun Gratification of a sexual passion or desire, as in an illicit relation.
  • noun A kindness; something done in token of love.
  • noun A thin silk stuff. One variety, soft and translucent, was used for veils. See love-ribbon.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English lufu; see leubh- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English loven, lovien, from Old English lufian ("to love, cherish, sow love to; fondle, caress; delight in, approve, practice"), from the noun lufu ("love"). See above. Compare West Frisian leavje ("to love"), German lieben ("to love").

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English love, luve, from Old English lufu ("love, affection, desire"), from Proto-Germanic *lubō (“love”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewbʰ-, *leubʰ- (“love, care, desire”). Cognate with Old Frisian luve ("love"), Old High German luba ("love"). Related to Old English lēof ("dear, beloved"), līefan ("to allow, approve of"), Latin libet, lubō ("to please") and Albanian lyp ("to beg, ask insistently"), lips ("to be demanded, needed"), Serbo-Croatian ljubiti, ljubav, Russian любовь, любить.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English loven, lovien, from Old English lofian ("to praise, exalt, appraise, value"), from Proto-Germanic *lubōnan (“to praise, vow”), from *luban (“praise”), from Proto-Indo-European *leubʰ- (“to like, love, desire”), *lewbʰ-. Cognate with Scots love, lofe ("to praise, honour, esteem"), Dutch loven ("to praise"), German loben ("to praise"), Swedish lova ("to promise, pledge"), Icelandic lofa ("to promise"). See also lofe.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From the phrase Neither for love nor for money, meaning "nothing".

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Examples

Comments

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  • see wuv

    December 6, 2006

  • "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" by Queen.

    December 21, 2006

  • ...Consider the word "love". It has many meanings which we recognize as soon as we consider the difference between romantic love and conjugal love, the difference between the love that parents readily bestow upon their children and the love that children slowly develop for their parents. All these meanings of the word — all these kinds of love — have something in common. All are related aspects of a single, very large idea — the idea of love. But as most people employ the word in ordinary speech, they have only a small part of this idea in mind; and when young people use it they seldom have in mind the same part that older people have. Few who use the word ever have the whole idea in mind, for it takes a lifetime of experience and thought to comprehend it fully...

    --excerpt from "What is an Idea", 1958, by Mortimer Adler

    December 27, 2006

  • For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.

    -Charles Bukowski

    April 8, 2007

  • This is hot.

    June 24, 2007

  • "...Love all things--not because it is your duty to do so, but because all things are worthy of your love. Hate nothing. Fear nothing. Have absolute faith. Whoso will do this is wise; he is more than wise--he is happy."

    --Concluding paragraph: Man's Moral Nature, An Essay by Richard Maurice Bucke, M.D.

    March 30, 2008

  • See How 8-year-old Kids Describe Love.

    May 21, 2008

  • The Love Attitude Scale (LAS), including movie and book examples of various types of love.

    August 23, 2008

  • hello

    October 15, 2008

  • *quickly flips his League Of Villainous Entities membership card face down*

    October 15, 2008

  • I Love Me, vol. I

    October 18, 2008

  • "Love, and do what you like." -- St. Augustine

    March 2, 2009

  • H♥me. Where ever it is. People who talk about love excessively are usually the ones who do not know a thing about it... ;o| That is my sad, personal, experience.

    March 3, 2009

  • I always get this confused with vole. No wonder it's so hard finding keeping a boyfriend. But on the other hand, my cats are well-fed.

    *Sings: "Lookin' for vole in all the wrong places…"*

    March 3, 2009

  • You are single?! Men have such bad taste.

    March 3, 2009

  • Cat ladies are good to have around, rolig. ;o} I am going to join the club some day. (Hey you, rolig means fun/nice in swedish, so, if nomen est omen, you are going to be just fine...) Vole is a new word for me... Maybe your boyfriends have been voletile....? Hmmph. I got madeupical away, didn't I?

    March 3, 2009

  • I didn't know that, Lea, that's really nice!

    Pro, I only said that for the joke. I do have a lovely boyfriend, who's not at all volish. But it's true about the cats. They're well-fed.

    March 3, 2009

  • Rolig also means calm in Danish.

    March 3, 2009

  • calm and fun/nice, I like it. On the other hand, a Russian friend pronounces my name Ролик (Rólik), which means "ball bearing" in her language…

    March 3, 2009

  • Lea, I just now noticed your pun! Voletile! Very nice.

    March 3, 2009

  • Love has been looked up 3,947 times, favorited 16 times, listed 253 times, commented on 21 times, and has a Scrabble score of 7.

    July 24, 2010

  • Love always wins.

    (Cf. hate, hatred, and like.)

    July 24, 2010

  • :-) Thank you, Prolagus.

    July 24, 2010

  • I don't understand what it is.

    November 20, 2010

  • Who does?

    November 20, 2010

  • I do. But I'm not telling you.

    November 21, 2010

  • lol. good answers ;)

    November 21, 2010

  • My whole life (meaning ever since I was nineteen) I have been trying to ascertain the quiddity of love. Obviously, such remains elusive.

    November 21, 2010

  • what the hell are you? if you emo how do you know what love is? BRAPTING1

    January 18, 2011

  • CD 20 prods me to snigger.

    Make it stop!

    March 21, 2011

  • That's exactly what I love about the Century Dictionary! Did you see CD 16?

    March 21, 2011

  • anyone have a good definition? the definitions are horrid. I swear the definitions were written by the 'i like turtles' kid.

    what. the. f___. is. love?

    May 6, 2011

  • A little difficult!~What do you think?

    December 15, 2011

  • Have y'all analyzed the most commented on words yet? This one must be up there :-) ❤

    February 2, 2012

  • Something's happened to me. I've stopped abstracting. this is love: you stop bothering about the universal, the general, get sucked instead into the local and particular: When will I see her again? What shall we do today? Do you like these shoes? Theory and reflection are delicate old uncles bustled out of the way by boisterous nephews action and desire. Themes evaporate, only plot remains. From "The Last Werewolf" by Glen Duncan.

    I love this quote (pun intended) because unlike most of the definitions it emphasises that love is actually more commonly an active verb not just a passive experience or noun.

    March 26, 2012

  • www.real-pleasure.co.uk/massages best erotic massage

    May 7, 2012

  • http://www.real-pleasure.co.uk super girls for you visit my thank you

    May 7, 2012

  • I just loved (or "favorited") this word, but only so I could add it to my recently-loved-words list.

    February 6, 2013

  • Somehow that feels like cheating, but it can't really be since you make the rules for your list...

    February 6, 2013

  • If the truth is known, I do love love on its own merits.

    I especially love this CD&C definition: "An old game in which one holds up one or more fingers, and another, without looking, guesses at the number."

    Edit: I also love the one about the love-ribbon.

    February 6, 2013

  • "In Tasmania, the blue creeper."

    Urrghh. Why always me?

    p.s. You'd have to allow for half-finger guesses given the extent of the sawmill industry around here.

    February 6, 2013

  • I am in love with Brennan Walton!

    May 6, 2015

  • Looked up over 69k times.

    April 24, 2017

  • Woow

    September 15, 2020