drown

American

[droun] / draʊn /

verb (used without object)

to die under water or other liquid of suffocation.

verb (used with object)

to kill by submerging under water or other liquid.
to destroy or get rid of by, or as if by, immersion.

He drowned his sorrows in drink.
to flood or inundate.

Synonyms:

soak, drench, submerge, engulf, deluge
to overwhelm so as to render inaudible, as by a louder sound (often followed byout ).
to add too much water or liquid to (a drink, food, or the like).
to slake (lime) by covering with water and letting stand.

verb phrase

drown in
1. to be overwhelmed by.
  
  The company is drowning in bad debts.
2. to be covered with or enveloped in.
  
  The old movie star was drowning in mink.

drown British

/ draʊn /

verb

to die or kill by immersion in liquid
(tr) to destroy or get rid of as if by submerging

he drowned his sorrows in drink
(tr) to drench thoroughly; inundate; flood
to render (a sound) inaudible by making a loud noise

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

drown Idioms

More idioms and phrases containing drown

like a drowned rat

Other Word Forms

drowner noun
half-drowned adjective
half-drowning adjective
undrowned adjective

Etymology

Origin of drown

1250–1300; Middle English drounnen, Old English druncnian, perhaps by loss of c between nasals and shift of length from nn to ou

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

This isn’t about drowning vegetables in dairy until they forget who they are.

From Salon

And so much of his brain was drowning in thoughts like, All those times I said the Pledge of Allegiance at school—doesn’t that count for anything?

From Literature

A mock drowning in the pool, floating face down in the water as his mother does a butterfly stroke back and forth right next to him.

From Salon

The heart, which came from another young boy who drowned, arrived "burned by frostbite," the child's family's lawyer, Francesco Petruzzi, said.

From BBC

She simply drowns them out with the sound machine as she drifts into a deep sleep.

From The Wall Street Journal

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023