Definition
adjCapable of producing great physical force.
adjCapable of withstanding great physical force.
Sentence Examples
The bridge couldn't sustain the force of the strong current and collapsed.
Flying against a strong wind is very difficult.
He's strong enough to lift a car!
Word Origin & History
From Middle English strong, strang, from Old English strang (“strong”), from Proto-West Germanic *strang (“severe, strict, rigorous, strong”), from Proto-Germanic *strangaz (“tight, strict, straight, strong”), from Proto-Indo-European *strengʰ- (“taut, stiff, tight”).
Cognate with Scots strang (“strong”), Saterland Frisian strang, West Frisian string (“austere, strict, harsh, severe, stern, stark, tough”), Dutch streng (“strict, severe, tight”), German streng (“strict, severe, austere”), Danish and Norwegian streng (“strong, hard”), Faroese and Icelandic strangur (“strict”), Norwegian strang (“strong, harsh, bitter”), Swedish sträng, strang (“severe, strict, harsh”), Latin stringō (“tighten”). Related to strict and string.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"For he was swift as swallow in her flight,
And strong as Lyon in his lordly might."
— 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
"But what sight is that? It seems a town right in the river, each building standing upon its own foundation, with the deep, strong current of the river sweeping all around it? They are flouring mills operated by the natural current of the stream."
— 1853 April 26, Warren Isham, “Notes from Hungary”, in Warren Isham, editor, The Michigan Farmer, volume XI, number 4:
"Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker."
— 1889, Friedrich Nietzsche, “Sprüche und Pfeile [Maxims and Arrows]”, in Götzen-Dämmerung, oder, Wie man mit dem Hammer philosophiert [Twilight of the Idols, or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer]:
"A wise man is strong, yea a man of knowledge encreaseth strength."
— 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Proverbs 24:5:
"Perhaps we grows very strong, stronger than Wraiths. Lord Smeagol? Gollum the Great? The Gollum! Eat fish every day, three times a day, fresh from the sea."
— 1954, J[ohn] R[onald] R[euel] Tolkien, “The Passage of the Marshes”, in The Two Towers (The Lord of the Rings; 2), HarperCollinsPublishers, published 2001, page 619: