divide

PIE word
*dwóh₁

From Middle English dividen, from Latin dīvidere (“to divide”). Displaced native Old English tōdǣlan.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪˈvaɪd/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪd

divide (third-person singular simple present divides, present participle dividing, simple past and past participle divided)

1. (transitive) To split or separate (something) into two or more parts.

   Synonyms: cut up, disunite, partition, split, split up

   Antonyms: combine, merge, unify, unite

   a wall divides two houses; a stream divides the towns

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Kings 3:25:

     Divide the living child in two.

2. (transitive) To share (something) by dividing it.

   Synonyms: divvy up, divide up, share, share out, apportion

   How shall we divide this pie?

   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 1:

     true justice unto people to divide

3. (transitive) To cause (a group of people) to disagree.

   Words divide us, Wiktionary unites us.

   • 2021 December 15, “Has the Pandemic Torn Your Family Apart?”, in The New York Times‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-12-12:

     For nearly two years, the pandemic has been dividing families over issues like social distancing, mask-wearing, and vaccines. Now that the holiday season is here and families are gathering, many issues that have been simmering are reaching a boiling point.

   • 2023 April 29, Will Pavia, “Why butter must come out of the fridge”, in The Times‎^[2], London: News UK, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 28 April 2023:

     It is a debate that divides Americans as evenly as any of the great political issues of the day. Should they leave their butter on the counter, or must they keep it in the fridge?

4. (transitive, arithmetic, with by) To calculate the number (the quotient) by which you must multiply one given number (the divisor) to produce a second given number (the dividend).

   Antonym: multiply

   If you divide 6 by 3, you get 2.

5. (transitive, arithmetic) To be a divisor of.

   3 divides 6.

6. (intransitive) To separate into two or more parts.

   Synonyms: separate, shear, split, split up

7. (intransitive, biology) Of a cell, to reproduce by dividing.
   • 2013 July 20, “Welcome to the plastisphere”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:

     [The researchers] noticed many of their pieces of [plastic marine] debris sported surface pits around two microns across. Such pits are about the size of a bacterial cell. Closer examination showed that some of these pits did, indeed, contain bacteria, and that in several cases these bacteria were dividing and thus, by the perverse arithmetic of biological terminology, multiplying.

8. To disunite in opinion or interest; to make discordant or hostile; to set at variance.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Mark 3:24:

     If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.

   • 1838, William H[ickling] Prescott, History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Boston, Mass.: American Stationers’ Company; John B. Russell, →OCLC:

     Every family became now divided within itself.

9. (obsolete) To break friendship; to fall out.
   • 1605, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of King Lear, I. ii. 107:

     love cools, friendship / falls off, brothers divide.

10. (obsolete) To have a share; to partake.
    • 1608, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Coriolanus, I. vi. 87:

      Make good this ostentation, and you shall / Divide in all with us.

11. To vote, as in the British parliament and other legislatures, by the members separating themselves into two parties (as on opposite sides of the hall or in opposite lobbies), that is, the ayes dividing from the noes.
    • 1776–1788, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: […] W[illiam] Strahan; and T[homas] Cadell, […], →OCLC:

      The emperors sat, voted, and divided with their equals.

12. To mark divisions on; to graduate.

    to divide a sextant

13. (music) To play or sing in a florid style, or with variations.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

      About the bed sweet musicke did divide

• (act of dividing): division
• (the sum being divided; the upper term in a fraction): dividend
• (the number of parts in a division; the lower term in a fraction): divisor
• divisive

• fraction, fraction slash, ⁄, fraction bar, vinculum (Australia)
• ratio, ∶ (also improperly :)
• (product of division): quotient
• (extra amount left by uneven division): remainder
• division sign, obelus, ÷
• division slash, ∕ (also improperly /)
• long division symbol, division bracket, )‾ or |‾

divide (plural divides)

1. A thing that divides.

   Stay on your side of the divide, please.

2. An act of dividing.

   The divide left most of the good land on my share of the property.

   • 1975, Byte, numbers 1-8, page 14:

     The extended instruction set may double the speed again if a lot of multiplies and divides are done.

3. A distancing between two people or things.

   There is a great divide between us.

4. (geography) A large chasm, gorge, or ravine between two areas of land.

   If you're heading to the coast, you'll have to cross the divide first.

   The team crossed streams and jumped across deep, narrow divides in the glacier.

   • 1922, A. M. Chisholm, A Thousand a Plate:

     Carrying light packs they left camp at daylight the next morning. Trails there were none; but they followed the general course of a small creek, crossed a divide, and dipped down into a beautifully timbered valley watered by a swift, large creek of almost riverlike dimensions.

5. (hydrology) The topographical boundary dividing two adjacent catchment basins, such as a ridge or a crest.

• great divide

• “divide”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

• divied

divide

1. inflection of dividir:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

• IPA^(key): /diˈvi.de/
• Rhymes: -ide
• Hyphenation: di‧vì‧de

divide

1. third-person singular present indicative of dividere

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈdiː.u̯i.de/, [ˈd̪iːu̯ɪd̪ɛ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈdi.vi.de/, [ˈd̪iːvid̪e]

dīvide

1. second-person singular present active imperative of dīvidō

• Hyphenation: di‧vi‧de

divide

1. inflection of dividir:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

Borrowed from Latin dividere.

a divide (third-person singular present divide, past participle not used) 3rd conj.

1. (transitive, reflexive) to divide

   Synonyms: diviza, împărți

• IPA^(key): /diˈbide/ [d̪iˈβ̞i.ð̞e]
• Rhymes: -ide
• Syllabification: di‧vi‧de

divide

1. inflection of dividir:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative