• enPR: dī, IPA: /daɪ/

From Middle English deyen, from Old English diegan and Old Norse deyja, both from Proto-Germanic *dawjaną.

die (dies, present participle dying; simple past and past participle died)

1. (intransitive) To stop living; to become dead; to undergo death.
   • c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC ↗; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act I, scene i ↗:

     Returne with ſpeed, time paſſeth ſwift away,
     Our life is fraile, and we may dye to day.

   • 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC ↗, Canto XXXV, page 54 ↗:

     The cheeks drop in; the body bows;
     Man dies: nor is there hope in dust: […]

   1. followed by of as an indication of direct cause; general use:

      He died of malaria.

      • 1838, Boz [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], chapter 6, in Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress. […], volume (please specify |volume=I, II, or III), London: Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC ↗:

        "What did she die of, Work'us?" said Noah.
        "Of a broken heart, some of our old nurses told me," replied Oliver […] .

      • 2000, Stephen King, On Writing, Pocket Books, published 2002, page 85:

        In 1971 or 72, Mom's sister Carolyn Weimer died of breast cancer.

   2. followed by from as an indication of direct cause; general use, though somewhat more common in the context of medicine or the sciences:

      He died from heart failure.

   3. followed by for; often expressing wider contextual motivations, though sometimes indicating direct causes:

      He died for the one he loved.

      • 1961, Joseph Heller, Catch-22, Simon & Schuster, published 1999, page 232:

        Englishmen are dying for England, Americans are dying for America, Germans are dying for Germany, Russians are dying for Russia. There are now fifty or sixty countries fighting in this war.

      • 2003, Tara Herivel, Paul Wright, editors, Prison Nation, Routledge, page 187:

        Less than three days later, Johnson lapsed into a coma in his jail cell and died for lack of insulin.

   4. (now, rare) followed by with as an indication of direct cause:
      • 1598–1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “Much Adoe about Nothing”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act III, scene i]:

        Therefore let Benedicke like covered fire, / Consume away in sighes, waste inwardly: / It were a better death, to die with mockes, / Which is as bad as die with tickling.

   5. (uncommon, nonstandard, outside, video games) followed by to as an indication of direct cause (like from):

      I can't believe I just died to a turret!

      • 2014, S. J. Groves, The Darker Side to Dr Carter, page 437:

        Dr Thomas concluded she had died to a blow to the head, which led to a bleed on the brain, probably a fall and had hit her head hard on the wooden bedpost, as there was blood on the bedpost.

   6. (still current) followed by with as an indication of manner:

      She died with dignity.

   7. (in bare form) to die in a certain form.

      Will I die a happy man?

2. (transitive) To (stop living and) undergo (a specified death).

   He died a hero's death.

   They died a thousand deaths.

3. (video games, slang) To lose or be eliminated from a game, particularly with a deathlike animation.

   Whenever my brother dies, he ragequits.

4. (intransitive, figuratively) To yearn intensely.

   I'm dying for a packet of crisps.

   I'm dying for a piss.

   • 1598–1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “Much Adoe about Nothing”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act III, scene ii]:

     Yes, and his ill conditions; and in despite of all, dies for him.

   • 2004, Paul Joseph Draus, Consumed in the city: observing tuberculosis at century's end, page 168:

     I could see that he was dying, dying for a cigarette, dying for a fix maybe, dying for a little bit of freedom, but trapped in a hospital bed and a sick body.

5. (intransitive, uncommon, idiomatic) To be or become hated or utterly ignored or cut off, as if dead.

   The day our sister eloped, she died to our mother.

   • 2015, Emily Duvall, Inclusions, page 150:

     "My dad […] beat us until we couldn't sit down." […] "What about your mother?" […] "She's alive. […] My aunt visits her once a year, but I don't ask about my mother. She died to me the day she chose my father over protecting us." Luke's voice hitched with emotion.

   • 2017, Mike Hoornstra, Descent into the Maelstrom, page 366:

     "You haven't been my son since you were ten years old. That boy died to me the day he ran away. I don't know you. You are merely a shell that resembles someone I used to know, but you are dead to me. You are the bringer of pain and death. Leave me be. Leave me with my son, Jyosh." "Mother..." Barlun pleaded.

6. (intransitive, figuratively) To become spiritually dead; to lose hope.

   He died a little inside each time she refused to speak to him.

7. (intransitive, colloquial, hyperbolic) To be mortified or shocked by a situation.

   If anyone sees me wearing this ridiculous outfit, I'll die.

8. (intransitive, figurative, hyperbolic) To be so overcome with emotion or laughter as to be incapacitated.

   When I found out my two favorite musicians would be recording an album together, I literally planned my own funeral arrangements and died.

   • 1976, an anchorman on Channel Five in California, quoted in Journal and Newsletter ↗ [of the] California Classical Association, Northern Section:

     I literally died when I saw that.

9. (intransitive, of a, machine) To stop working; to break down or otherwise lose "vitality".

   My car died in the middle of the freeway this morning.

   Sorry I couldn't call you. My phone died.

   My battery died and my charger was at home.

10. (intransitive, of a, computer program) To abort, to terminate (as an error condition).
11. (intransitive, of a, legislative bill or resolution) To expire at the end of the session of a legislature without having been brought to a vote.

    The proposed gas tax died after the powerful rural senator refused to let it out of committee.

12. To perish; to cease to exist; to become lost or extinct.
    • 1714 September 26 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “WEDNESDAY, September 15, 1714”, in The Spectator, number 594; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume VI, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC ↗:

      letting the secret die within his own breast

      The spelling has been modernized.

    • 1847, Alfred Tennyson, “(please specify the page number, or |part=Prologue, I to VII, or conclusion)”, in The Princess: A Medley, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC ↗:

      Great deeds cannot die.

    • 1905, Lord Dunsany [i.e., Edward Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany], The Gods of Pegāna, London: [Charles] Elkin Mathews, […], →OCLC ↗, page 88 ↗:

      Through all the Worlds are sounds, the noises of moving, and the echoes of voices and song; but upon the River is no sound ever heard, for there all echoes die.

13. To sink; to faint; to pine; to languish, with weakness, discouragement, love, etc.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC ↗, 1 Samuel 25:37 ↗:

      But it came to passe in the morning, when the wine was gone out of Nabal, and his wife had told him these things, that his heart died within him, and he became as a stone.

14. (often with "to") To become indifferent; to cease to be subject.

    to die to pleasure or to sin

15. (architecture) To disappear gradually in another surface, as where mouldings are lost in a sloped or curved face.
16. To become vapid, flat, or spiritless, as liquor.
17. (of a stand-up comedian or a joke, slang) To fail to evoke laughter from the audience.

    Then there was that time I died onstage in Montreal...

• (to stop living) assume room temperature, bite the dust, bite the big one, buy the farm, check out, code, cross over, cross the river, decompose, dematerialize, expire, succumb, give up the ghost, pass, pass away, pass on, be no more, meet one's maker, be a stiff, push up the daisies, hop off the twig, kick the bucket, shuffle off this mortal coil, join the choir invisible
• See also Thesaurus:die

• dead
• death
• buried
• bury

see die/translations

From Middle English dee, from Old French de (Modern French dé), from Latin datum, from datus ("given"), the past participle of dō, from Proto-Indo-European *deh₃-.

Replaced Old English tasul, tesul, from Latin tessella (“die, cube”).

die (plural dies)

1. The cubical part of a pedestal; a plinth.
2. A device for cutting into a specified shape.
3. A device used to cut an external screw thread. (Internal screw threads are cut with a tap.)
4. A mold for forming metal or plastic objects.
5. An embossed device used in stamping coins and medals.
6. (semiconductors, plural also dice) An oblong chip fractured from a semiconductor wafer engineered to perform as an independent device or integrated circuit.
7. Any small cubical or square body.
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die (plural dice)

1. An isohedral polyhedron, usually a cube, with numbers or symbols on each side and thrown in games of chance.

   Most dice are six-sided.

   I rolled the die and moved 2 spaces on the board.

   • 1748, [David Hume], “Of Probability”, in Philosophical Essays Concerning Human Understanding, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC ↗, page 94 ↗:

     If a Dye were mark’d with one Figure or Number of Spots on four Sides, and with another Figure or Number of Spots on the two remaining Sides, ’twould be more probable, that the former ſhould turn up than the latter;

2. (obsolete) That which is, or might be, determined, by a throw of the die; hazard; chance.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC ↗, stanza 13, page 249 ↗:

     […] For th'equall die of warre he well did know.

• cube of chance
• cube of fortune

see die/translations

Variant spelling.

die (plural dies)

1. Obsolete spelling of dye

die (dies, present participle dying; simple past and past participle died)

1. Obsolete spelling of dye
   • 1739, John Cay, An abridgment of the publick statutes in force and use from Magna Charta, in the ninth year of King Henry III, to the eleventh year of his present Majesty King George II, inclusive, Drapery, XXVII. Sect. 16:

     Also no dyer shall die any cloth, except he die the cloth and the list with one colour, without tacking any bulrushes or such like thing upon the lists, upon pain to forfeit 40 s. for every cloth. And no person shall put to sale any cloth deceitfully dyed,

A jocular rearrangement of DEI, implying that such criteria will lead to a highly unfavorable result.

die (uncountable)

1. (derogatory, humorous) Initialism of diversity, inclusion and equity