transfigure

[trans-fig-yer or, esp. British, -fig-er]

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verb (used with object), trans·fig·ured, trans·fig·ur·ing.

to change in outward form or appearance; transform.

to change so as to glorify or exalt.

Origin of transfigure

1250–1300; Middle English transfiguren < Latin trānsfigūrāre to change in shape. See trans-, figure

Related formstrans·fig·ure·ment, nounun·trans·fig·ured, adjective

Synonyms for transfigure

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1. transmute, renew.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for transfigure

transmute, interchange, modify, make, transpose, transform, metamorphose, remodel, turn, switch, commute, reorganize, transmogrify, transubstantiate, download, apply, appropriate, translate, alter, revise

Examples from the Web for transfigure

Contemporary Examples of transfigure

So neither polling nor political theory can transfigure the human heart or orient our minds toward the brotherhood of man?
Dear Frank Luntz: Here’s How to Be Happy Again
James Poulos
January 8, 2014

Historical Examples of transfigure

He looked taller, his face shone with a serenity that seemed to transfigure him.
Abbe Mouret's Transgression
Emile Zola
Then amazed recognition, love, happiness, transfigure her face.
Lost
Edward Bellamy
It is here to transfigure all; we must accept with it the merer things it glorifies.
Browning's Heroines
Ethel Colburn Mayne
She believes in her power to renew and transfigure them, to achieve in them a moral miracle.
Lux Mundi
Various
You must have the imagination of a poet to transfigure them.
The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table
Oliver Wendell Holmes

British Dictionary definitions for transfigure

transfigure

verb (usually tr)

to change or cause to change in appearance

to become or cause to become more exalted

Derived Formstransfigurement, noun

Word Origin for transfigure

C13: from Latin transfigūrāre, from trans- + figūra appearance

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

Word Origin and History for transfigure

c.1300, from Old French transfigurer (12c.), from Latin transfigurare "change the shape of," from trans- "across" (see trans-) + figurare "to form, fashion," from figura "to form, shape," from figura "a shape, form, figure" (see figure (n.)). Related: Transfigured; transfiguring.