Loosen Meaning
/ˈluːsn̩/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
verbTo make loose.
verbTo become loose.
Sentence Examples
When will you ever loosen your purse strings?
I like to do a few exercises to loosen up before I run.
CEFR Practice Quiz
He had to slowly ____ his necktie because it was pressed tightly against his throat.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
I had to ____ the tie because it was feeling a bit too tight around my neck during the long meeting.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *lewh₁- Proto-Indo-European *lewHs-der. Proto-Germanic *leusaną Proto-Germanic *lausaz Old Norse laussbor. Middle English loos English loose English -en English loosen From loose + -en.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"In order to deal with deposits of soot on boiler-tubes while running, especially if poor coal is in use, locomotives are often now provided with blowers on the firebox back-plate which can be made to discharge a jet of high pressure steam towards the firebox tubeplates; this has the effect of loosening and blowing off the soot deposits."
— 1944 May and June, “The Why and the Wherefore: Locomotive Soot Blowers”, in Railway Magazine, page 194:
"[...] and on the Saturday heavy seas pounded the W.R. on its exposed coastal stretch between Dawlish and Teignmouth, loosening the ballast and forcing trains to proceed with extreme caution."
— 1960 December, “Talking of Trains: The railways and the Devon floods”, in Trains Illustrated, page 709:
"His days at the villa had loosened his body and freed his tenseness […]"
— 1992, Michael Ondaatje, chapter 10, in The English Patient, London: Picador, published 1993, page 265:
"The subtile shower the earth hath softned so,
And with the waues, the trees tost to and fro;
That the rootes loosen, and the tops downe sway,
So that whole Forrests quickly swimme away."
— 1630, Michael Drayton, “Noahs Floud”, in The Muses Elizium Lately Discouered, London: John Waterson, page 108:
"The sea scurvy is attended with an universal putrefaction, the teeth loosen, old wounds that had been healed again open […]"
— 1764, Oliver Goldsmith, An History of England, in a Series of Letters from a Nobleman to his Son, London: J. Newbery, Volume 2, Letter 19, p. 159:
Explore More C1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
He had to slowly ____ his necktie because it was pressed tightly against his throat.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
I had to ____ the tie because it was feeling a bit too tight around my neck during the long meeting.