Definition of "die"

die¹

/daɪ/

verb
third-person singular simple present dies, present participle dying, simple past and past participle died
1. (intransitive) To stop living; to become dead; to undergo death.
  1. followed by of as an indication of direct cause; general use:
    Quotations
    "What did she die of, Work'us?" said Noah. "Of a broken heart, some of our old nurses told me," replied Oliver […] .
    1838, Boz [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], chapter 6, in Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy’s Progress. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I, II, or III), London: Richard Bentley, […]
    In 1971 or 72, Mom's sister Carolyn Weimer died of breast cancer.
    2000, Stephen King, On Writing, Pocket Books, published 2002, page 85
  2. followed by from as an indication of direct cause; general use, though somewhat more common in the context of medicine or the sciences:
    Quotations
    She lived several weeks; but afterwards she died from epilepsy, to which malady she had been previously subject.
    1865 March 4, British Medical Journal, page 213
    "Or all of them will die from the plague. Even if most of the candidates succumb […] "
    2007, Frank Herbert, Kevin J. Anderson, Sandworms of Dune, Tor, published 2007, page 191
  3. followed by for; often expressing wider contextual motivations, though sometimes indicating direct causes:
    Quotations
    Englishmen are dying for England, Americans are dying for America, Germans are dying for Germany, Russians are dying for Russia. There are now fifty or sixty countries fighting in this war.
    1961, Joseph Heller, Catch-22, Simon & Schuster, published 1999, page 232
    Less than three days later, Johnson lapsed into a coma in his jail cell and died for lack of insulin.
    2003, Tara Herivel, Paul Wright, editors, Prison Nation, Routledge, page 187
  4. (now rare) followed by with as an indication of direct cause:
    Quotations
    Therefore let Benedicke like covered fire, / Consume away in sighes, waste inwardly: / It were a better death, to die with mockes, / Which is as bad as die with tickling.
    1598–1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “Much Adoe about Nothing”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene i]
    And there were some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year was very frequent in the land.
    1830, Joseph Smith, The Book of Mormon, Richards, published 1854, page 337
  5. (uncommon, nonstandard outside video games) followed by to as an indication of direct cause (like from):
    Quotations
    Dr Thomas concluded she had died to a blow to the head, which led to a bleed on the brain, probably a fall and had hit her head hard on the wooden bedpost, as there was blood on the bedpost.
    2014, S. J. Groves, The Darker Side to Dr Carter, page 437
  6. (still current) followed by with as an indication of manner:
2. (transitive) To (stop living and) undergo (a specified death).
  Quotations
  […] he chose instead to suffer even greater personal pain, with unimaginable fortitude and resolve, albeit for a shorter time. Thus he died a small death, in order to benefit the living. Similarly, a small and voluntary death was died by Socrates.
  2019, Lou Marinoff, On Human Conflict: The Philosophical Foundations of War and Peace, Rowman & Littlefield, page 452
3. (video games, slang) To lose a game.
  Quotations
  Of course, Nazis are not present in this game. Instead, we have animals that will try to cover you with dirt. As soon as you get too dirty, you will die.
  1995, “Slobzone”, in Coming Soon! magazine‎ (video game review)
4. (intransitive, figuratively) To yearn intensely.
  Quotations
  Yes, and his ill conditions; and in despite of all, dies for him.
  1598–1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “Much Adoe about Nothing”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene ii]
  I could see that he was dying, dying for a cigarette, dying for a fix maybe, dying for a little bit of freedom, but trapped in a hospital bed and a sick body.
  2004, Paul Joseph Draus, Consumed in the city: observing tuberculosis at century's end, page 168
5. (intransitive, uncommon, idiomatic) To be or become hated or utterly ignored or cut off, as if dead.
  Quotations
  "My dad […] beat us until we couldn't sit down." […] "What about your mother?" […] "She's alive. […] My aunt visits her once a year, but I don't ask about my mother. She died to me the day she chose my father over protecting us." Luke's voice hitched with emotion.
  2015, Emily Duvall, Inclusions, page 150
  "You haven't been my son since you were ten years old. That boy died to me the day he ran away. I don't know you. You are merely a shell that resembles someone I used to know, but you are dead to me. You are the bringer of pain and death. Leave me be. Leave me with my son, Jyosh." "Mother..." Barlun pleaded.
  2017, Mike Hoornstra, Descent into the Maelstrom, page 366
6. (intransitive, figuratively) To become spiritually dead; to lose hope.
  Quotations
  Do you know that I went down / To the ground / Landed on both my broken-hearted knees... / […] I didn't even cry / 'Cause pieces of me had already died
  2011, Ingrid Michaelson (lyrics and music), “Ghost”, in Human Again‎
7. (intransitive, colloquial, hyperbolic) To be mortified or shocked by a situation.
8. (intransitive, figurative, hyperbolic) To be so overcome with emotion or laughter as to be incapacitated.
  Quotations
  I literally died when I saw that.
  1976, an anchorman on Channel Five in California, quoted in Journal and Newsletter [of the] California Classical Association, Northern Section
9. (intransitive, of a machine) To stop working; to break down or otherwise lose "vitality".
10. (intransitive, of a computer program) To abort, to terminate (as an error condition).
11. (intransitive, of a legislative bill or resolution) To expire at the end of the session of a legislature without having been brought to a vote.
12. To perish; to cease to exist; to become lost or extinct.
  Quotations
  letting the secret die within his own breast
  1714 September 26 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “WEDNESDAY, September 15, 1714”, in The Spectator, number 594; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume VI, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853
  Great deeds cannot die.
  1847, Alfred Tennyson, “(please specify the page number, or |part=Prologue, I to VII, or conclusion)”, in The Princess: A Medley, London: Edward Moxon, […]
  Through all the Worlds are sounds, the noises of moving, and the echoes of voices and song; but upon the River is no sound ever heard, for there all echoes die.
  1905, [Edward Plunkett,] Lord Dunsany, The Gods of Pegāna‎, London: Elkin Mathews, […], page 88
13. To sink; to faint; to pine; to languish, with weakness, discouragement, love, etc.
  Quotations
  But it came to passe in the morning, when the wine was gone out of Nabal, and his wife had told him these things, that his heart died within him, and he became as a stone.
  1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], 1 Samuel 25:37
  When the truth is found to be lies / And all the joy within you dies / Don't you want somebody to love? / Don't you need somebody to love?
  1965, Darby Slick, “Somebody to Love”, in Surrealistic Pillow‎, performed by Jefferson Airplane, published 1967
14. (often with "to") To become indifferent; to cease to be subject.
15. (architecture) To disappear gradually in another surface, as where mouldings are lost in a sloped or curved face.
16. To become vapid, flat, or spiritless, as liquor.
17. (of a stand-up comedian or a joke) To fail to evoke laughter from the audience.

die²

/daɪ/

noun
plural dies
1. The cubical part of a pedestal; a plinth.
2. A device for cutting into a specified shape.
3. A device used to cut an external screw thread. (Internal screw threads are cut with a tap.)
4. A mold for forming metal or plastic objects.
5. An embossed device used in stamping coins and medals.
6. (semiconductors, plural also dice) An oblong chip fractured from a semiconductor wafer engineered to perform as an independent device or integrated circuit.
  Quotations
  The number of dies per wafer is basically the area of the wafer divided by the area of the die.
  2002, John L. Hennessy, David A. Patterson, Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach, Elsevier, page 19
  Once the wafer has undergone the wafer-probe test, it is separated into individual dice by sawing or scribing and breaking. The dice are visually inspected, sorted, and readied for assembly into packages.
  2009, Paul R. Gray, Analysis and Design of Analog Integrated Circuits, 5th edition, John Wiley & Sons, page 159
7. Any small cubical or square body.
  Quotations
  Some young creatures have learnt their letters and syllables, and the pronouncing and spelling of words, by having them pasted or written upon many little flat tablets or dies.
  1741, I[saac] Watts, The Improvement of the Mind: Or, A Supplement to the Art of Logick: […], London: […] James Brackstone, […]
noun
plural dice or (nonstandard) dies
1. An isohedral polyhedron, usually a cube, with numbers or symbols on each side and used in games of chance.
  Quotations
  If a Dye were mark’d with one Figure or Number of Spots on four Sides, and with another Figure or Number of Spots on the two remaining Sides, ’twould be more probable, that the former ſhould turn up than the latter;
  1748, [David Hume], “Of Probability”, in Philosophical Essays Concerning Human Understanding, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], page 94
  When you roll two dies—or three, or four—the odds of obtaining a specific number becomes complex in a logarithmic progression.
  2000, Richard Shoup, edited by Barry Lenson, Take Control Of Your Life: How to Control Fate, Luck, Chaos, Karma, and Life’s Other Unruly Forces, McGraw-Hill, page 42
  We roll two dies repeatedly until we get the first double.
  2012, Rinaldo B. Schinazi, “Probability Space”, in Probability with Statistical Applications, 2nd edition, Birkhäuser, “Independent Events”, “Exercises”, page 16
  Roll two dies 24 times. What is the probability of rolling at least one double 6?
  2014, Ionut Florescu, Ciprian A. Tudor, Handbook of Probability, John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
  When this creature enters the battlefield, roll a six-sided die. You gain life equal to the result.
  2017 December 8, “Adorable Kitten”, in Unstable, Wizards of the Coast
2. (obsolete) That which is, or might be, determined, by a throw of the die; hazard; chance.
  Quotations
  […] For th'equall die of warre he well did know.
  1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, stanza 13, page 249

die³

/daɪ/

noun
plural dies
1. Obsolete spelling of dye
  Quotations
  He hath carried his friendship to this man to a blameable length, by too long concealing facts of the blackest die.
  1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones
verb
third-person singular simple present dies, present participle dying, simple past and past participle died
1. Obsolete spelling of dye
  Quotations
  Also no dyer shall die any cloth, except he die the cloth and the list with one colour, without tacking any bulrushes or such like thing upon the lists, upon pain to forfeit 40 s. for every cloth. And no person shall put to sale any cloth deceitfully dyed,
  1739, John Cay, An abridgment of the publick statutes in force and use from Magna Charta, in the ninth year of King Henry III, to the eleventh year of his present Majesty King George II, inclusive, Drapery, XXVII. Sect. 16
  To die wool with madder, prepare a fresh liquor, and when the water is come to a heat to bear the hand, put in half a pound of the finest grape madder for each pound of wool;
  1813, James Haigh, The Dier's Assistant in the Art of Dying Wool and Woollen Goods
  To die Wool and Woollen Cloths of a Blue Colour. One part of indigo, in four parts concentrated sulphuric acid, dissolved; then add one part of dry carbonate of potash, [...]
  1827, John Shepard, The artist & tradesman's guide: embracing some leading facts

Definition of "die"

die1

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die2

noun

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die3

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die¹

die²

die³