celebrate
Formscelebrates, celebrating, celebrated
- 1To take part in joyful activities that show appreciation for an event.
When the results came in, supporters celebrated late into the night.
Families across the country celebrate the new year with fireworks.
Similarparty, rejoice, revel, mark
Oppositemourn
Note
The one use that can stand without an object: "let's celebrate!" Phil McNulty's 2012 BBC Sport match report has another: "As Di Matteo celebrated." With an object, it still names the occasion, as in celebrating a promotion. The weight, though, falls on the festivity rather than on dutiful observance. If nothing follows the verb, this is the meaning a listener hears.
- 2To honor an occasion with rites and ceremonies of joy and respect, or by setting aside ordinary business to observe it duly.
The town celebrates its founding each spring with parades and public ceremonies.
Observant families celebrate the Sabbath by refraining from work.
Note
Here the object is an occasion rather than a person: a birthday, a harvest thanksgiving, the Sabbath. Its closest partners are observe and keep. Like them, it can mean marking a day by setting ordinary work aside, with no festivity at all. The passive comes naturally, as in Harold Bindloss's "the harvest thanksgiving was shortly to be celebrated." Contrast the joyful, partying sense, where the merriment itself is the point.
- 3To perform or take part in a sacrament or solemn rite, carrying it out with the appropriate ceremonies.
The priest celebrated the Eucharist before a packed congregation.
Clergy celebrate the sacraments according to long-established liturgical forms.
Note
A liturgical use in which the subject is often the person who carries out the rite: a priest celebrates a marriage or the Eucharist. Those who take part can be said to celebrate too. Solemnize is the near-synonym, and both stress that the rite is performed in its proper form. Unlike observing an occasion, the object here is the ceremony itself, not the day it marks.
- 4To extol or honor someone or something in a solemn, dignified manner.
Nations celebrate their founders in statues, anthems, and solemn speeches.
The ode celebrated the memory of the fallen leader.
Oppositedisparage
Note
A sense with the Latin crowd still inside it. Celebrō meant to frequent or go to in great numbers, from celeber, "populous," so to honor something was first to throng to it. Here the object is usually a person, a name or a memory, as in the name of the Most High or the memory of a fallen leader. The tone is lofty. Fete is the festive near-synonym, but this sense leans toward praise rather than party.
Practice
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Origin
From Middle English celebraten, borrowed from Latin celebrātus, the perfect passive participle of celebrō ("to frequent, honor, or praise"), which in turn comes from celeber ("frequented, populous"). It displaced the native Old English fæġnian.