SHORTENED • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Shortened

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/ʃˈɔrtənd/ Listen

verb

Shorten v. t. (past & past part. shortened; pres. part. shortening)

To make short or shorter in measure, extent, or time; as, to shorten distance; to shorten a road; to shorten days of calamity.

To reduce or diminish in amount, quantity, or extent; to lessen; to abridge; to curtail; to contract; as, to shorten work, an allowance of food, etc. "Here, where the subject is so fruitful, I am shortened by my chain."

To make deficient (as to); to deprive; with of. "Spoiled of his nose, and shortened of his ears."

To make short or friable, as pastry, with butter, lard, pot liquor, or the like.

To shorten a rope (Naut.), to take in the slack of it.

To shorten sail (Naut.), to reduce sail by taking it in.

Shorten v. i. To become short or shorter; as, the day shortens in northern latitudes from June to December; a metallic rod shortens by cold.

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Etymology of 'Shortened'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Shortened" Quotes from Famous Books

... shook the wind out of him; but that was nothing by comparison with the fact that, in the same moment, Jan's viselike jaws closed about one side of his neck, close in to the skull where the hair shortened. That was a serious moment, if you like, for Sourdough; for in addition to the huge power of those jaws there was weight—a hundred and sixty-four pounds of sinew, bone, and rubber-like muscle behind ...

— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson

... Tarfe drew his dagger and brandished it above his throat. Terror filled the Christian ranks; a shout of triumph rose from those of the Moors. But suddenly Tarfe was seen to loosen his grasp and roll over in the dust. Garcilasso had shortened his sword and, as Tarfe raised his arm, had struck him ...

— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris

... more charity except for the helpless. The lengthening of the death roll has fearfully shortened the list to be provided for. There is now an abundance of food and clothing to satisfy the present necessities of all who are in need. Beginning to-morrow morning, June 5th, aid will not be extended to any who are able to work except in payment ...

— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker

... closely interested and whose communications, whose Roman, Sorrentine, Florentine letters, letters in especial from the Baths of Lucca, kept open, in our air, more than any other sweet irritation, that "question of Europe" which was to have after all, in the immediate years, so limited, so shortened, a solution. Mary Temple the elder had, early in our Fourteenth Street period, married Edmund Tweedy, a haunter of that neighbourhood and of our house in it from the first, but never more than during a winter spent with us there by that quasi-relative, who, by an extension ...

— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James

... light of morning did not reveal anything especially new or important. There were half a dozen small schooners, fishermen, loafing under shortened canvas in the vicinity of the wreck. One of the tugs ...

— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

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