pure
//ˈpjʊə̯//
Forms
- Comparative
- purer
- Superlative
- purest
- Plural
- pures
- present (v1)
- pure
- past (v2)
- pured
- past participle (v3)
- pured
- present participle
- puring
- 3rd person singular
- pures
Definitions
1.Free of flaws or imperfections; unsullied.
- Such was the origin of a friendship as warm and pure as any that ancient or modern history records.
2.Free of foreign material or pollutants.
- A guinea is pure gold if it has in it no alloy.
- "Hetch Hetchy water is the purest, wholly unpolluted, and forever unpollutable."
- As for the rest, the air here is said to be purer than elsewhere in Ireland; the water of the Nore is beautifully transparent; and the bogless state of the land helps out the rhyme.
3.Free of immoral behavior or qualities; clean.
4.Mere; that and that only.
- That idea is pure madness!
1.to a great extent or degree; extremely; exceedingly.
- I just get pure shy with the interview cats.
1.To hit (the ball) completely cleanly and accurately.
- Tiger Woods pured his first drive straight down the middle of the fairway.
1.Alternative form of puer (“dung (e.g. of dogs)”).
2.One who, or that which, is pure.
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #2391
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Rare
- General reading & writing
- Uncommon
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Etymology
From Middle English pure, pur, from Old French pur, from Latin pūrus (“clean, free from dirt or filth, unmixed, plain”), from Proto-Indo-European *pewH- (“to cleanse, purify”).