Leave Meaning

/ˈliːv/
A1

Definition, CEFR level A1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.

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verbTo have a consequence or remnant.

verbTo have a consequence or remnant., To cause or allow (something) to remain as available; to refrain from taking (something) away; to stop short of consuming or otherwise depleting (something) entirely.

Close the door when you leave.
Tell them to call me before they leave.
Please do not leave your personal belongings unattended in the library.
Synonyms:
Antonyms:
CEFR Practice Quiz
Employees must ____ the building immediately when the fire alarm sounds continuously.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
Don't forget to ____ a small tip for the waiter if you were satisfied with the service at the restaurant.

From Middle English leven, from Old English lǣfan (“to leave”), from Proto-West Germanic *laibijan, from Proto-Germanic *laibijaną (“to let stay, leave”), causative of *lībaną (“to stay, remain”), from Proto-Indo-European *leyp- (“to stick; fat”). Cognate with Old Frisian lēva (“to leave”), dialectal Dutch loven (“to have left over, save, keep”), Old Saxon lēvian, Old High German leiban (“to leave”), Old Norse leifa (“to leave over”) (whence Icelandic leifa (“to leave food uneaten”), Swedish leva (“to leave”)), lifna (“to be left”) (whence Danish levne). More at lave, belive. The noun is attested since the 19th century, with earliest references to billiards.

"[…] St. Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London. Close-packed, crushed by the buttressed height of the railway viaduct, rendered airless by huge walls of factories, it at once banished lively interest from a stranger's mind and left only a dull oppression of the spirit." — 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter VII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
"Plant breeding is always a numbers game.[…]. The wild species we use are rich in genetic variation,[…]. In addition, we are looking for rare alleles, so the more plants we try, the better. These rarities may be new mutations, or they can be existing ones that are neutral—or are even selected against—in a wild population. A good example is mutations that disrupt seed dispersal, leaving the seeds on the heads long after they are ripe." — 2013 May-June, David Van Tassel, Lee DeHaan, “Wild Plants to the Rescue”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:
"There was some laughter, and Roddle was left free to expand his ideas on the periodic visits of cowboys to the town. “Mason Rickets, he had ten big punkins a-sittin' in front of his store, an' them fellers from the Upside-down-F ranch shot 'em up[…].”" — 1899, Stephen Crane, chapter 1, in Twelve O'Clock:
"The slightest effort made the patient cough. He would stand leaning on a stick and holding a hand to his side, and when the paroxysm had passed it left him shaking." — 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XXIII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
"[Rural solar plant] schemes are of little help to industry or other heavy users of electricity. Nor is solar power yet as cheap as the grid. For all that, the rapid arrival of electric light to Indian villages is long overdue. When the national grid suffers its next huge outage, as it did in July 2012 when hundreds of millions were left in the dark, look for specks of light in the villages." — 2013 July 20, “Out of the gloom”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:

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CEFR Practice Quiz
Employees must ____ the building immediately when the fire alarm sounds continuously.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
Don't forget to ____ a small tip for the waiter if you were satisfied with the service at the restaurant.

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