Definitions

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

  • intransitive verb To use up or put out; expend.
  • intransitive verb To pay out (money).
  • intransitive verb To wear out; exhaust.
  • intransitive verb To pass (time) in a specified manner or place.
  • intransitive verb To throw away; squander.
  • intransitive verb To give up (one's time or efforts, for example) to a cause; sacrifice.
  • intransitive verb To pay out or expend money.
  • intransitive verb To be exhausted or consumed.
  • noun An amount of money spent on something.
  • noun The spending of money; expenditure.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To pay or give out for the satisfaction of need, or the gratification of desire; part with for some use or purpose; expend; lay out: used of money, or anything of exchangeable value.
  • To impart; confer; bestow for any reason; dispense.
  • To consume; use up; make away with; dispose of in using.
  • To pass; employ; while away: used of time, or of matters implying time.
  • To waste or wear out by use or action; incur the loss of. See phrase to spend a mast, below.
  • To exhaust of means, force, strength, contents, or the like; impoverish; enfeeble; only in the passive. See spent.
  • To cause the expenditure of; cost.
  • To pay or layout; make expenditure of money, means, strength, or anything of value.
  • To be lost or wasted; be dissipated or consumed; go to waste: as, the candles spend fast.
  • Specifically, to emit semen, milt, or spawn. See spent, 2.
  • To span; grasp with the hand or fingers.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • intransitive verb To expend money or any other possession; to consume, use, waste, or part with, anything.
  • intransitive verb To waste or wear away; to be consumed; to lose force or strength; to vanish.
  • intransitive verb To be diffused; to spread.
  • intransitive verb (Mining) To break ground; to continue working.
  • transitive verb To weigh or lay out; to dispose of; to part with.
  • transitive verb To bestow; to employ; -- often with on or upon.
  • transitive verb To consume; to waste; to squander; to exhaust.
  • transitive verb To pass, as time; to suffer to pass away.
  • transitive verb To exhaust of force or strength; to waste; to wear away.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb to pay out (money)
  • verb to exhaust, to wear out
  • verb to consume, to use up (time)
  • verb dated, intransitive to have an orgasm; to ejaculate sexually
  • noun Amount spent (during a period), expenditure
  • noun pluralized expenditures; money or pocket money.
  • noun Discharged semen

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb pay out
  • verb spend completely
  • verb pass time in a specific way

Etymologies

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

[Middle English spenden, partly from Old English -spendan (from Latin expendēre, to expend; see expend) and partly from Old French despendre, to weigh out; see dispense.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English spenden, from Old English *spendan (attested in compounds āspendan ("to spend"), forspendan ("to use up, consume")), from Proto-Germanic *spendanan, *spendōnan (“to spend”), borrowed from Latin expendere ("to weigh out"). Cognate with Old High German spentōn ("to consume, use, spend") (whence German spenden ("to donate, provide")), Middle Dutch spenden ("to spend, dedicate"), Old Icelandic spenna ("to spend").

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Examples

  • Don't make too big a fool of yourself, nor marry your tango teacher, but spend my million, Drusilla, _spend it_ -- and may God rest your soul!

    Drusilla with a Million Elizabeth Cooper 1911

  • But we are to have the railroad to Mt. Jackson by Christmas, perhaps sooner; and then, if we can raise the wind, we can spend a portion of the winter in the city, and I hope you will find time to come up and _spend the day_ with me, as we will be near neighbors.

    Behind the Scenes or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House Elizabeth Keckley 1862

  • In polls that employ the term "spend" or "spending" in describing the additional stimulus, its support drops to an average of 44 percent, with 50 percent saying that deficit reduction is the higher priority:

    NYT > Home Page By NATE SILVER 2011

  • I don't really like the term spend back because it sounds like there is some kind of price competition to buy the consumers 'willingness to use our products.

    SeekingAlpha.com: Home Page 2009

  • Until very recently, it seems most conservatives understood that to spend is to tax.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » The Wave of Corporate Writedowns 2010

  • Until very recently, it seems most conservatives understood that to spend is to tax.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » The Wave of Corporate Writedowns 2010

  • Salesmen and even bankers preached the doctrine that to spend is to enlarge the activity of business.

    The Outlook for 1931 1930

  • When you think about the expression spend your life, you’ll come to a sobering realization: Your life is something that you actually do spend every day, just as surely as if you were pulling out your wallet and peeling off hours like dollar bills as payment for each day’s experiences and memories.

    The Answer John Assaraf 2008

  • When you think about the expression spend your life, you’ll come to a sobering realization: Your life is something that you actually do spend every day, just as surely as if you were pulling out your wallet and peeling off hours like dollar bills as payment for each day’s experiences and memories.

    The Answer John Assaraf 2008

  • A. -- Yes, it's awfully funny and nice, makes our cunts what they call spend with pleasure.

    The Power of Mesmerism A Highly Erotic Narrative of Voluptuous Facts and Fancies Anonymous

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