How do you use the word "starve" in a sentence?

Here are real-life examples of using "starve": I might as well drown as starve. We cannot stand quiet and watch people starve.

Starve Meaning

/stɑːv/

Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.

Definition

verbTo die because of lack of food or of not eating.

verbTo suffer severely because of lack of food or of not eating.

Sentence Examples

I might as well drown as starve.

We cannot stand quiet and watch people starve.

The animals were left to starve to death.

Synonyms & Antonyms

Synonyms:

hunger

Antonyms:

feed

CEFR Practice Quiz

The animals in the drought will ____ if they cannot find water and grass.

CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)

If we don't bring enough food for the long hike, we will probably ____ before we reach the summit.

Word Origin & History

From Middle English sterven (“to die, perish”), from Old English steorfan (“to die, perish”), from Proto-West Germanic *sterban, from Proto-Germanic *sterbaną (“to become stiff, die”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)terp- (“to lose strength, become numb, be motionless”); or from Proto-Indo-European *sterbʰ- (“to become stiff”), from *ster- (“stiff”); or a conflation of the aforementioned. Cognate with Scots stairve, sterve (“to die, perish, starve”), Saterland Frisian stjerwa (“to die”), West Frisian stjerre (“to die”), Dutch sterven (“to die”), German Low German starven (“to die”), German sterben (“to die”), Icelandic stirfinn (“peevish, froward”), Albanian shterp (“sterile, unproductive, barren land”).

Literary Quotations & Historical Citations

"During the Cultural Revolution I was exiled to Xincai County in Henan Province. There, 36 percent of the people starved to death in the early 1960s." — 1990, Chen Yizi (陳一諮), quotee, Children of the Dragon: The Story of Tiananmen Square, →ISBN, page 48:

""When all of you starve to death, Shasta, don't come crying to me, that's all."" — 2007, Lisa Wingate, A Thousand Voices, page 76:

"Ah (ſaid the Ape as ſighing vvondrous ſad) / Its an hard caſe, vvhen men of good deſeruing / Muſt either driuen be perforce to ſteruing, / Or asked for their pas by euerie ſquib: […]" — 1591, Ed[mund] Sp[enser], “Prosopopoia. Or Mother Hubberds Tale.”, in Complaints. Containing Sundrie Small Poemes of the Worlds Vanitie. […], London: […] William Ponsonbie, […], →OCLC:

"..., and the little half-starved, stunted girl of twelve, with her brown arms and steady, unerring aim, will hammer out half a bundle, IS. 6½d." — 1884, Jacob Schoenhof, The Destructive Influence of the Tariff Upon Manufacture and Commerce and the Figures and Facts Relating Thereto, page 62:

"Mildly it [the wind] kiſt our ſailes, and, freſh, and ſvveet, / As, to a ſtomack ſterv'd, vvhoſe inſides meete, / Meate comes, it came; and ſvvole our ſailes, vvhen vvee / So joyd, as Sara' her ſvvelling joy'd to ſee." — a. 1631 (date written), J[ohn] Donne, “The Storme. To Mr. Christopher Brooke.”, in Poems, […] with Elegies on the Authors Death, London: […] M[iles] F[lesher] for Iohn Marriot, […], published 1633, →OCLC, page 57:

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