revivify

American  

[ri-viv-uh-fahy] / rɪˈvɪv əˌfaɪ /

verb (used with object)

revivified, revivifying

1. to restore to life; give new life to; revive; reanimate.

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revivify British  

/ rɪˈvɪvɪˌfaɪ /

verb

1. (tr) to give new life or spirit to; revive

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Other Word Forms

• revivification noun

Etymology

Origin of revivify

1665–75; < French révivifier < Late Latin revīvificāre. See re-, vivify

Explanation

To bring something back to life, or to inject new energy in it, is to revivify. A few days of rain can revivify an area that's been suffering a mild drought. If you've been up late all week studying for a big exam, you might need a good night's sleep to revivify you. For some people, the short, dark days of winter are a little depressing, while the spring sunshine can revivify them. Anything that gives you new life or energy revivifies you. The Old French vivifier, "come alive," and the prefix re-, "again," are at the root of revivify.

Example Sentences

BIRTH/REBIRTH In the summer’s second spin on “Frankenstein” — see “The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster,” above — Marin Ireland plays a pathologist who aims to revivify a dead child.

From New York Times • May 24, 2023

The effect of the literal trains and the physical doors is to revivify concepts that are so much a part of popular consciousness that they have become abstract, almost generic.

From The New Yorker • Nov. 6, 2019

If anyone can revivify the Frankenstein story, it’s adventurous, prize-winning British writer Jeanette Winterson.

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 10, 2019

But Stevenson has also created a new dynamic of collection and dispersal to help revivify memory of the state’s ugly and sordid past.

From Washington Post • Apr. 27, 2018

Its kindling rays revivify our nations, which have slept While round the world our influence through you has slowly crept.

From Poems by Stoddard, John L. (John Lawson)