Surround
Pronunciation
- Rhymes: -aÊŠnd
Origin
Middle English sourrounden, "to submerge, overflow", from Middle French souronder or suronder, from Late Latin superundare, from super + undare, "to rise in waves".
Full definition of surround
Verb
- (transitive) To encircle something or simultaneously extend in all directions.
- 1944, Miles Burton, The Three Corpse Trick Chapter 5, The hovel stood in the centre of what had once been a vegetable garden, but was now a patch of rank weeds. Surrounding this, almost like a zareba, was an irregular ring of gorse and brambles, an unclaimed vestige of the original common.
- 1963, Margery Allingham, The China Governess Chapter 3, Sepia Delft tiles surrounded the fireplace, their crudely drawn Biblical scenes in faded cyclamen blending with the pinkish pine, while above them, instead of a mantelshelf, there was an archway high enough to form a balcony with slender balusters and a tapestry-hung wall behind.
- 2005, Plato, Sophist. Translation by Lesley Brown. Stephanus pagination.and this way they get rid of those grand and stubborn opinions that surround them.
- (transitive) To enclose or confine something on all sides so as to prevent escape.
- (transitive, obsolete) To pass around; to travel about; to circumnavigate.to surround the world
Synonyms
Noun
surround
(plural surrounds)- (British) Anything, such as a fence or border, that surrounds something.
- 1972, Frederick Forsyth, , , 670-52042-x, chapter 15, page 283:He drifted through the room, avoiding the furniture by instinct, closed the door that led to the passage, and only then flicked on his flashlight.It swept around the room, picking out a desk, a telephone, a wall of bookshelves, and a deep armchair, and finally settled on a handsome fireplace with a large surround of red brick.