# burn

Pronunciation: say "BURN" US /bɝn/, UK /bɜːn/

## Verb

1. To be on fire and be destroyed by flames, or to destroy something by setting it on fire.
   - Simple: To be on fire, or to set something on fire so it is destroyed.
   - _Forests burn rapidly during a long drought._
   - _The candle burned steadily through the evening._
2. To cause a substance to combine with oxygen or another reactive agent, releasing heat; to oxidize.
   - Simple: To make something join with oxygen or another chemical and give off heat.
   - _The engine burns fuel, combining it with oxygen to release heat._
   - _In the lab, students burn magnesium ribbon in air to turn it into magnesium oxide._
3. To consume, damage, or change something as though by fire or heat.
   - Simple: To damage or change something the way fire or heat would.
   - _Frost burned the tender seedlings overnight._
   - _Strong bleach will burn the colors out of the fabric._
5. To harm a person or animal through heat, or through chemicals whose effects are similar.
   - Simple: To hurt a person or animal with heat or strong chemicals.
   - _Spilled acid can burn exposed skin badly._
   - _The boiling water burned the child's arm._
7. Of a body part, to sting with a hot pain, or of a spice, chemical, or similar substance, to cause a hot, stinging pain.
   - Simple: Of a body part, to hurt with a hot, stinging pain, or of a spice or chemical, to cause that pain.
   - _By the last mile of the hike, her thighs were burning._
   - _Aftershave can burn if you put it on right after shaving._
9. To spoil or damage something, such as food or a machine part, by overheating it, or to be spoiled or ruined this way.
   - Simple: To ruin something, such as food or a machine, by making it too hot, or to be ruined this way.
   - _Overloading the circuit will burn the transformer._
   - _I got distracted by a phone call and burned the toast again._
10. Of a light, a fire, or a color: to glow or shine strongly, the way a lamp left on or fall leaves do.
   - Simple: Of a light, fire, or color, to give off a strong, bright glow, like a lamp that is left on.
   - _Lights were still burning on the top floor long after midnight._
   - _In the late afternoon sun, the hills burn gold._
14. To cause someone to lose money or come to other harm, especially by cheating them, through a bad deal, or when their trust proves misplaced. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To make someone lose money or be harmed, often by cheating them or through a bad deal.
   - _Plenty of small investors got burned when the fund collapsed._
   - _After her business partner emptied their joint account, she swore no one would burn her like that again._
15. To develop reddened, sore skin as a result of too much sun exposure.
   - Simple: To get sore, red skin from too much sun.
   - _With my fair skin, I burn within ten minutes at the beach unless I wear sunscreen._
   - _Tourists often burned on the first day of their trip._
11. To long for something intensely, or to fix all one's drive on attaining it.
   - Simple: To want something very strongly.
   - _He burned for recognition his entire career._
   - _Young athletes who burn for gold train relentlessly._
12. To write data onto a permanent storage medium such as a CD or a ROM chip.
   - Simple: To copy data onto a disc or chip so it stays there for good.
   - _He burned the installer image onto a blank disc._
   - _You can burn the firmware onto a ROM chip with the right tool._
16. To consume fuel or stored energy in making heat or power, in the way the body uses up calories and fat.
   - Simple: To use up fuel or energy to make heat or power, like your body using calories.
   - _Muscles burn fat as well as sugar during a long, steady run._
   - _The backup generator burns about a gallon of diesel every hour._
18. To insult someone, or to defeat them soundly. *(slang)*
   - Simple: To make someone look foolish with a sharp insult, or to beat them easily.
   - _He totally burned the other team in the debate._
   - _Rivals love to burn each other on social media._
13. To waste time, money, or other resources.
   - Simple: To use up time, money, or other things in a careless way.
   - _He burned thousands of dollars on a doomed startup._
   - _We can't afford to burn any more time on this problem._
20. To betray someone, especially a person who trusted you. *(slang)*
   - Simple: To betray someone who trusts you.
   - _After he burned his oldest friend to get the promotion, nobody at the office trusted him again._
   - _He swore he would never burn a partner, no matter the pressure._
21. To feel hot, often as a result of an emotion such as embarrassment.
   - Simple: To feel very hot, often from a strong feeling like shame.
   - _His cheeks burned with embarrassment as the room fell silent._
   - _I could feel my face burn at the unexpected compliment._
24. To make or produce something through the application of fire or intense heat.
   - Simple: To make something by using fire or strong heat.
   - _The bricks for the old church were burned in a kiln just outside the village._
   - _In the hills above town, a few families still burn lime in stone kilns and sell it to local builders._
25. To cauterize a wound or tissue, using heat to seal or destroy it.
   - Simple: To seal a wound or destroy tissue using heat.
   - _The surgeon burned the edges of the cut to close it._
   - _Doctors can burn abnormal tissue to keep it from spreading._
26. Of an element, to be turned into another element through nuclear fusion, especially in a star; of a star, to fuse an element in this way.
   - Simple: Of an element, to turn into another element through nuclear fusion, or of a star, to use an element this way.
   - _Hydrogen burns to helium in the core of every main-sequence star._
   - _Heavier elements burn only when a star grows hot enough._
28. To compromise an agent's cover story, revealing their true identity.
   - Simple: To expose a secret agent's false identity.
   - _The leak burned three operatives working under deep cover._
   - _A single mistake can burn an agent who took years to embed._
29. To darken a chosen area of an image, traditionally by giving that area more light exposure during darkroom printing.
   - Simple: To make part of a photo darker on purpose.
   - _The printer burned the bright background to recover lost detail._
   - _Photographers often burn the edges of a portrait to frame the face._
31. To shoot someone using a firearm. *(slang)*
   - Simple: To shoot a person with a gun.
   - _He burned the rival dealer in broad daylight._
   - _Word on the street was that the gang had a gun waiting and would burn him the minute he came back to town._
32. To blackmail a person, coercing them with threats to reveal damaging information.
   - Simple: To force someone to do something by threatening to reveal a secret.

## Noun

4. An injury to the skin or other body tissue caused by heat, cold, friction, electricity, radiation, or caustic chemicals.
   - Simple: An injury to the skin or body caused by heat, cold, rubbing, electricity, radiation, or strong chemicals.
   - _Chemical burns can be more serious than they first appear._
   - _The paramedic dressed the burn before the ambulance arrived._
6. An occasion when something, such as a field or undergrowth, is deliberately set on fire.
   - Simple: The act of setting fire to something.
   - _The annual burn of the fields renews the soil._
   - _Officials scheduled a controlled burn to reduce wildfire risk._
8. A hot, stinging or aching feeling, including the one felt in the muscles during hard exercise.
   - Simple: A hot, stinging or aching feeling, sometimes felt in your muscles during hard exercise.
   - _By the last set of squats, she could feel the burn spreading through her thighs._
   - _A faint burn lingered on his lips after the spicy meal._
17. An effective insult, especially a clever or cutting one. *(slang)*
   - Simple: A clever insult that makes someone look foolish.
   - _Her reply landed as the sharpest burn of the night._
   - _The crowd cheered after that savage burn._
19. A scorch mark, hole, or other damage that fire or heat has made in something.
   - Simple: A mark or hole made in something by fire or something hot.
   - _The landlord kept part of the deposit because of a cigarette burn in the carpet._
   - _Sparks from the fireplace left tiny burns all over the rug._
22. An intense emotional sting, such as the feeling left by shame or an effective insult. *(slang)*
   - Simple: The sharp, painful feeling left by shame or a strong insult.
   - _The burn of public failure can linger for years._
   - _Her cruel words left a burn he couldn't shake._
23. The process of writing data to a permanent storage medium such as a CD or ROM chip.
   - Simple: The act of copying data onto a disc or chip so it stays there.
   - _The burn failed halfway through, leaving the disc unusable._
   - _If you run other heavy programs during the burn, the disc may end up with unreadable files._
27. A maneuver in which a spacecraft fires its rockets to change its trajectory.
   - Simple: A short firing of a spacecraft's engines to change where it is going.
   - _Mission control scheduled the burn for ninety seconds before reentry._
   - _A precise burn placed the probe on course for Mars._
30. In Scottish and northern English use, a large stream. *(dialectal, Northern England, Scotland)*
   - Simple: In Scotland and the north of England, a big stream.
   - _We followed the burn down through the glen until it reached the loch._
   - _After a week of rain the burn was running high and brown under the old stone bridge._

## Other meanings

- (verb) To render subtitles directly into a video while transcoding it, making them a permanent part of the image.
- (noun) Tobacco, especially as used and traded among prisoners in Britain.
- (noun) The process of firing or baking material, as when making bricks, or the product of that process.
- (noun) A plant disease that leaves crops looking scorched, similar to blight or rust.
- (verb) Of substances, to react together vigorously while giving off heat.
- (verb) In hiding and searching games, to come very close to the thing being looked for.
- (verb) In curling, to touch a stone that is still sliding, by accident, with a broom or the body.
- (verb) In the card game pontoon, to exchange two cards for two new ones, or to deal out a card that is out of play.
- (verb) In card games, to put a card aside unused, especially the top card of the deck.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–29, 31–32** — From late Middle English burne, birne, a reshuffled form of brinne, brennen, which came from Old Norse brenna and took over the work of Old English byrnan and bærnan. It goes back to Proto-Germanic *brinnaną and an Indo-European root meaning 'to boil', and is a doublet of brew.
**Meaning 30** — Proto-Germanic *brunnô and Proto-West Germanic *brunnō gave Old English burne, burna ("spring, fountain"), which became Middle English burn, bourne. Bourn is a doublet, and cognates include Scots burn ("stream"), Dutch bron ("well"), and German Brunnen ("well").

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/burn (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).