# flee

Pronunciation: say "FLEE" /fliː/

## Verb

1. To run away in order to escape danger, harm, or trouble.
   - Simple: To run away quickly to reach safety or get out of danger.
   - _Residents began to flee as the floodwaters rose toward their homes._
   - _The rebels fled into the mountains under cover of darkness._
2. To escape from a place, situation, or pursuer by getting away from it.
   - Simple: To escape from a place, person, or danger by leaving it fast.
   - _Refugees flee their homeland when violence makes daily life impossible._
   - _He fled the country hours before the police came to arrest him._
3. To disappear quickly; to vanish or fade away in a moment.
   - Simple: To fade or disappear very quickly, almost in an instant.
   - _Daylight seemed to flee the instant the storm clouds gathered._
   - _All his doubts fled as the crowd began to cheer._

## Origin

"Flee" comes from Middle English flen, from Old English flēon, going back to Proto-Germanic *fleuhaną and a Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to fly, flow, run." It is related to Dutch vlieden, German fliehen, and, within English, to "fly" and more distantly "flow."

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