embrace

em-BRAYS/ɛmˈbɹeɪs/

Verbembraces, embracing, embraced

Noun pluralembraces

12 meanings of embrace

Practice

1
verbtransitive
To hold someone in your arms with affection; to take in the arms and hug.
He embraced his old friend warmly when they met again.
Parents often embrace their children before bedtime.
Similarhug, hold, clasp, cuddle
Note
The physical sense the others grow from. Middle English embracen meant to clasp in one's arms, but also to put a shield on the arm, to gird, to lace, even to ensnare or put into bonds. Arms that hold a friend could hold a weapon or a captive. Shakespeare's "I will embrace him with a soldier's arm" keeps a trace of that edge, while the King James Bible of 1611 has Paul embracing the disciples in farewell.
2
nouncountable
The act of putting your arms around someone and drawing them close to your chest; a hug.
He pulled her into a tight embrace as the train departed.
Their embraces grew less frequent as the years passed.
Similarhug, clasp, cuddle
Note
Writers have long paired the noun with partings. Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey has "a long and affectionate embrace" standing in for words of farewell. Tennyson's In Memoriam (1850) has a mother "parting with a long embrace," and Shakespeare writes "arms, take your last embrace." Beaumont and Fletcher add "chaste embraces." Long, last and affectionate are its natural companions.
3
verbfigurativelytransitive
To accept or take up something eagerly and gladly; to welcome it.
The community embraced the proposed changes with enthusiasm.
Good leaders embrace challenges rather than avoiding them.
Similarwelcome, accept, adopt, seize
Oppositereject, resist, avoid, spurn
4
nounfigurativelycountable
Complete acceptance of something, taken up willingly and without reservation.
The public's embrace of online shopping transformed retail.
His full embrace of the team's values impressed the coach.
Similaracceptance, adoption, endorsement
Oppositerejection
Note
The figurative hug becomes commitment, usually to a creed or idea. Muriel Spark's The Mandelbaum Gate (1965) speaks of "her eager embrace of Islam," and Faulkner's Light in August (1932) sends a man "into the embrace of a chimera, a blind faith." The usual frame is embrace of followed by the thing accepted. Into the embrace of suggests surrender rather than mere agreement.
5
verbfigurativelytransitive
To enfold or take in ideas, principles, or elements as part of a larger whole; to encompass.
The theory embraces several competing explanations at once.
Modern curricula embrace a wide range of disciplines.
Similarencompass, include, incorporate, cover, comprise
Oppositeexclude
6
verbfigurativelytransitive
To surround or enclose something; to encircle and encompass it.
Mountains embrace the valley on every side.
The harbor's arms embraced the calm waters within.
Similarsurround, entwine
7
nounfigurativelycountable
A surrounding enclosure that partly or fully wraps around someone or something.
The valley lay in the embrace of snow-capped peaks.
Within the bay's embrace, the boats rode out the storm.
Similarshelter, enclosure
Note
Landscape and weather supply the arms. Bret Harte's fog "caught him in its embrace," and in H. G. Wells's The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896) the narrator finds himself "within the embrace of a broad bay." The construction is nearly always possessive (its embrace, the embrace of), with in or within marking that something is held inside.
8
nounfigurativelycountable
An act of enfolding or including something within a larger whole.
The festival's embrace of many cultures drew visitors worldwide.
The policy's embrace of diverse opinions made it widely supported.
Similarinclusion, incorporation, acceptance
Oppositeexclusion
9
verbfigurativelytransitive
To submit to something and undergo it willingly; to accept what must be endured.
He embraced the difficult training without complaint.
Soldiers must embrace the dangers of their duty.
Similaraccept
Oppositeresist, reject
Note
Here what is embraced is not wanted but must be borne. Shakespeare's speaker embraces "this fortune patiently, since not to be avoided it falls on me." What separates it from the eager-welcome meaning is attitude: resignation rather than delight. A 2020 article in Rail shows the use is still current, describing a population that "largely embraced" strict social-distancing rules.

Less common meanings

10
verbobsoletefigurativelytransitive
To accept someone as a friend, or to welcome someone's help gladly.
He bears himſelfe more proudlier, / Euen to my perſon, then I thought he would / When firſt I did embrace him.
c. 1608, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”
Note
Friendship was once taken up with the same word as a hug. In Shakespeare's Coriolanus, a speaker resents that a newcomer bears himself more proudly "than I thought he would when first I did embrace him." The use is obsolete for people. Modern English keeps the welcoming of ideas and offers, the eager-acceptance meaning, but no longer embraces a person in the sense of befriending them.
11
verbobsoletetransitive
To fasten armor onto the body; to put on a piece of armor securely.
Note
Here the wearer clasps armor about himself. In Spenser's The Faerie Queene (1590), a knight sees an enemy approach and "his warlike arms about him gan embrace." The use descends from the Middle English meanings "to gird, put on" and "to put a shield on the arm," which lie behind the hugging sense. It is obsolete and rare, a word to recognize in Spenser rather than to use.
12
verbobsoletefigurativelytransitive
To attempt to influence a court or jury by corrupt means; to practice embracery.
Note
A term of the old law courts: the verb behind embracery, the offense of corruptly working on a jury. Blackstone's Commentaries (1769) sets out the penalties. The person embracing faces fine and imprisonment. The juror so embraced, if he took money, faces perpetual infamy and a year's imprisonment under statutes of Edward III. Briber and bribed share the verb, one active and one passive. The sense is obsolete.

Practice

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Origin

The verb comes from Middle English embracen ("to clasp in one's arms"), from Old French embracer, embracier ("to kiss"), from Late Latin *imbracchiāre, formed from in- ("in, within") plus bracchium ("arm"). The noun comes from the verb.