sought
Americanverb
verb
Other Word Forms
Explanation
I have long sought an answer to the following question: If sought is the past tense of seek, how come you say "we played hide and seek all afternoon" instead of "we hid and sought all afternoon?" Seek means to look for, and sought is what you say when you're done with the looking. "As a young man, I sought my fortune. Now it is time for me to sit by the fire, searching for the long-sought-after answer to the timeless question 'What did it all mean?'"
Vocabulary lists containing sought
"O Captain! My Captain!" Vocabulary from the poem
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Word Generation Weekly - Series 3
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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.
This year the company sought permission from the Garden Grove planning commission to construct a new employee break room on the site.
From Los Angeles Times • May 23, 2026
After IBM’s Deep Blue supercomputer scored a landmark victory over chess champion Garry Kasparov in 1997, researchers sought new simulations to push the frontiers of machine intelligence.
From MarketWatch • May 23, 2026
Since taking office in 2023, Milei, a free-market radical, has sought to boost mining in a country famous for farming but which also has vast reserves of copper, gold, lithium and uranium.
From Barron's • May 23, 2026
Lawyers for Abrego Garcia then sought to dismiss them, arguing he was being vindictively prosecuted by the justice department.
From BBC • May 22, 2026
The dowagers Ingram and Lynn sought solace in a quiet game at cards.
From "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë
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.
