Crossword Dictionary

What's The Definition Of Breed?

\Breed\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Bred}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Breeding}.] [OE. breden, AS. br[=e]dan to nourish, cherish, keep warm, from br[=o]d brood; akin to D. broeden to brood, OHG. bruoten, G. br["u]ten. See {Brood}.] 1. To produce as offspring; to bring forth; to bear; to procreate; to generate; to beget; to hatch. Yet every mother breeds not sons alike. --Shak. If the sun breed maggots in a dead dog. --Shak. 2. To take care of in infancy, and through the age of youth; to bring up; to nurse and foster. To bring thee forth with pain, with care to breed. --Dryden. Born and bred on the verge of the wilderness. --Everett. 3. To educate; to instruct; to form by education; to train; -- sometimes followed by up. But no care was taken to breed him a Protestant. --Bp. Burnet. His farm may not remove his children too far from him, or the trade he breeds them up in. --Locke. 4. To engender; to cause; to occasion; to originate; to produce; as, to breed a storm; to breed disease. Lest the place And my quaint habits breed astonishment. --Milton. 5. To give birth to; to be the native place of; as, a pond breeds fish; a northern country breeds stout men. 6. To raise, as any kind of stock. 7. To produce or obtain by any natural process. [Obs.] Children would breed their teeth with less danger. --Locke. Syn: To engender; generate; beget; produce; hatch; originate; bring up; nourish; train; instruct.
\Breed\, v. i. 1. To bear and nourish young; to reproduce or multiply itself; to be pregnant. That they breed abundantly in the earth. --Gen. viii. 17. The mother had never bred before. --Carpenter. Ant. Is your gold and silver ewes and rams? Shy. I can not tell. I make it breed as fast. --Shak. 2. To be formed in the parent or dam; to be generated, or to grow, as young before birth. 3. To have birth; to be produced or multiplied. Heavens rain grace On that which breeds between them. --Shak. 4. To raise a breed; to get progeny. The kind of animal which you wish to breed from. --Gardner. {To breed in and in}, to breed from animals of the same stock that are closely related.
\Breed\, n. 1. A race or variety of men or other animals (or of plants), perpetuating its special or distinctive characteristics by inheritance. Twice fifteen thousand hearts of England's breed. --Shak. Greyhounds of the best breed. --Carpenter. 2. Class; sort; kind; -- of men, things, or qualities. Are these the breed of wits so wondered at? --Shak. This courtesy is not of the right breed. --Shak. 3. A number produced at once; a brood. [Obs.] Note: Breed is usually applied to domestic animals; species or variety to wild animals and to plants; and race to men.