solemnize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to perform the ceremony of (marriage).
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to hold or perform (ceremonies, rites, etc.) in due manner.
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to observe or commemorate with rites or ceremonies.
to solemnize an occasion with prayer.
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to go through with ceremony or formality.
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to render solemn, serious, or grave; dignify.
verb (used without object)
verb
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to celebrate or observe with rites or formal ceremonies, as a religious occasion
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to celebrate or perform the ceremony of (marriage)
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to make solemn or serious
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to perform or hold (ceremonies, etc) in due manner
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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solemnizesimple
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solemnizessimple
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have solemnizedperfect
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has solemnizedperfect
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am solemnizingprogressive
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are solemnizingprogressive
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is solemnizingprogressive
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have been solemnizingperfect progressive
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has been solemnizingperfect progressive
Past
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solemnizedsimple
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had solemnizedperfect
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was solemnizingprogressive
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were solemnizingprogressive
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had been solemnizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of solemnize
1350–1400; Middle English solempnise < Medieval Latin sōlemnizāre, equivalent to Latin sōlemnis solemn + -izāre -ize
Explanation
When you solemnize something, you make it serious or dignified. You might solemnize a meal by lighting candles and saying grace before you eat. How much fun is it to get to pronounce a letter that is normally silent? You'll know when you wrap your tongue around this one, in which the n, normally silent in solemn, gets to introduce the suffix -ize. Even more fun is the fact that solemnize has a Greek suffix tacked onto a Latin root, sollemnis, or "formal, ceremonial, traditional." But we shouldn't be having so much fun with a verb whose meaning is "perform with dignity or gravity."
Vocabulary lists containing solemnize
"The Lady, or the Tiger?" by Frank R. Stockton
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Hard Times
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As You Like It
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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.
See Examples For:
Nine years later, when the United Kingdom allowed same-sex couples to solemnize their marriages in religious ceremonies, Ortega-Medina and his husband married in a Jewish ceremony at West London Synagogue.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 18, 2023
In choosing a scholar over a satirist, the Correspondents’ Association had sought to solemnize a dinner known for its comedic puncturing of the Washington bubble.
From New York Times ● Apr. 28, 2019
The wording he proposed would make clear that the government cannot force a clergy member to solemnize any marriage in violation of the clergy person’s religious beliefs.
From Washington Times ● Jul. 31, 2015
I wonder if we can evolve technologies of looking on the Web that solemnize and sacralize.
From Slate ● Nov. 6, 2014
Afterward all the Bishops and Abbots of Normandy assembled to solemnize the funerall.
From The Lives of the III Normans, Kings of England: William the First, William the Second, Henrie the First by Hayward, John
This is followed by an audience participation segment, in which Edna solemnizes the marriage between two perfect strangers, one of whom happened to be already married.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 29, 2015
It solemnizes and legitimizes and dignifies those who have departed into the squalid indignity of death, departed in a way so inhuman that humanity wants to pile on posthumous kindnesses, posthumous significances.
From Time Magazine Archive
I came here humble, poor, and empty-handed, and he solemnizes my return by offering presents to my mother and my sisters!
From The Youth of the Great Elector by Mühlbach, L. (Luise)
She grows every leaf, and opens every flower, and solemnizes every bird-marriage, and utters every hymn of praise in the truthful and innate spontaneity of her universal soul.
A something in a summer's day, As slow her flambeaux burn away, Which solemnizes me.
From Poems by Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete by Dickinson, Emily
They lured religious leaders out of their homes by pretending to need a marriage solemnized.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 10, 2023
The couple’s Nov. 29 marriage took place at the clerk’s office of the County of Nevada in Nevada City, Calif. Carrie McReynolds, the deputy commissioner of marriages, solemnized their license.
From New York Times ● Dec. 3, 2021
A grand boldness solemnized Mälkki’s performances of Russian scores by Tchaikovsky and Scriabin with the L.A.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 9, 2021
“It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.”
From Fox News ● Jul. 4, 2020
Marriages between such, solemnized on a visit to a State permitting, would occur.
From The Brothers' War by Reed, John Calvin
The Scottish Episcopal Church opened the door to solemnizing same-sex marriages in 2017, the Church of Scotland last May.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 20, 2023
Despite facing an outstanding arrest warrant for solemnizing Arzoo’s marriage, he continued his practice in his ramshackle office above a wholesale rice market in downtown Karachi.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 28, 2020
“I would really love the opportunity to participate in solemnizing Congress,” Barker said in an interview.
From Washington Post ● May 5, 2016
Not half a mile away a wedding was at that time taking place, and a man who called himself a minister could not discern the signs of the times, but was solemnizing a marriage.
From The End of the World A Love Story by Eggleston, Edward
Laws forbidding the solemnizing of marriage at certain times, namely, Advent and Lent; laws forbidding marriage with relatives, or with persons of a different religion or of no religion; laws with regard to age, etc.
From Baltimore Catechism, No. 4 An Explanation of the Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine by Kinkead, Thomas L.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
