Build Meaning
/bɪld/Definition, CEFR level A1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
verbTo form (something) by combining materials or parts.
verbTo develop or give form to (something) according to a plan or process.
Sentence Examples
You must build up your courage.
We opposed his plan to build a new road.
They have permission to build 200 new homes.
CEFR Practice Quiz
Using the wooden planks and nails, the children planned to ____ a small treehouse in the backyard.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
They are planning to ____ a new library in the center of the town.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree Proto-West Germanic *buþlijan Old English bytlan Middle English bylden English build From Middle English bilden, bulden, bylden, from Old English byldan and bytlan, bytlian (“to build”), from Proto-West Germanic *buþlijan (“to build”), from Proto-Germanic *buþlą, *bōþlą (“house, dwelling, farm”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰuH- (“to become, grow, thrive, be, live, dwell”). Related to Old English botl (“building, house”). More at bottle. False cognate of German bilden.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"It was a bridge ybuilt in goodly wize, / With curious Corbes and pendants grauen faire, [...]"
— 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], part II (books IV–VI), London: […] [Richard Field] for William Ponsonby, →OCLC, stanza 6, page 140:
"Athelstan Arundel walked home all the way, foaming and raging. No omnibus, cab, or conveyance ever built could contain a young man in such a rage. His mother lived at Pembridge Square, which is four good measured miles from Lincoln's Inn."
— 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC, page 16:
"A chap named Eleazir Kendrick and I had chummed in together the summer afore and built a fish-weir and shanty at Setuckit Point, down Orham way. For a spell we done pretty well."
— 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
"The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about […], or offering services that let you [...] "share the things you love with the world" and so on. But the real way to build a successful online business is to be better than your rivals at undermining people's control of their own attention."
— 2013 June 21, Oliver Burkeman, “The tao of tech”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 2, page 27:
"Since the launch early last year of […] two Silicon Valley start-ups offering free education through MOOCs, massive open online courses, the ivory towers of academia have been shaken to their foundations. University brands built in some cases over centuries have been forced to contemplate the possibility that information technology will rapidly make their existing business model obsolete."
— 2013 July 20, “The attack of the MOOCs”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:
Explore More A1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
Using the wooden planks and nails, the children planned to ____ a small treehouse in the backyard.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
They are planning to ____ a new library in the center of the town.