"throw up the sponge" meaning in All languages combined

See throw up the sponge on Wiktionary

Verb [English]

Audio: En-au-throw up the sponge.ogg Forms: throws up the sponge [present, singular, third-person], throwing up the sponge [participle, present], threw up the sponge [past], thrown up the sponge [participle, past]
Etymology: From a custom of the boxing ring, the person employed to sponge a pugilist between rounds throwing his sponge in the air in token of defeat. Head templates: {{en-verb|throw<,,threw,thrown> up the sponge}} throw up the sponge (third-person singular simple present throws up the sponge, present participle throwing up the sponge, simple past threw up the sponge, past participle thrown up the sponge)
  1. (intransitive, idiomatic, slang, archaic) To give up a contest; to acknowledge defeat; to throw in the towel. Tags: archaic, idiomatic, intransitive, slang
    Sense id: en-throw_up_the_sponge-en-verb-lMCyiu5K Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English light verb constructions, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries

Inflected forms

{
  "etymology_text": "From a custom of the boxing ring, the person employed to sponge a pugilist between rounds throwing his sponge in the air in token of defeat.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "throws up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "throwing up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "threw up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "thrown up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "throw<,,threw,thrown> up the sponge"
      },
      "expansion": "throw up the sponge (third-person singular simple present throws up the sponge, present participle throwing up the sponge, simple past threw up the sponge, past participle thrown up the sponge)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English light verb constructions",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1870, James Russell Lowell, “Lessing”, in Among My Books, Boston, Mass.: Fields, Osgood, & Co., →OCLC, page 330:",
          "text": "But he was too brave a man to throw up the sponge to fate, and had work to do yet.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To give up a contest; to acknowledge defeat; to throw in the towel."
      ],
      "id": "en-throw_up_the_sponge-en-verb-lMCyiu5K",
      "links": [
        [
          "give up",
          "give up"
        ],
        [
          "contest",
          "contest#Noun"
        ],
        [
          "acknowledge",
          "acknowledge"
        ],
        [
          "defeat",
          "defeat#Noun"
        ],
        [
          "throw in the towel",
          "throw in the towel"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(intransitive, idiomatic, slang, archaic) To give up a contest; to acknowledge defeat; to throw in the towel."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "archaic",
        "idiomatic",
        "intransitive",
        "slang"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-throw up the sponge.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/8/84/En-au-throw_up_the_sponge.ogg/En-au-throw_up_the_sponge.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/En-au-throw_up_the_sponge.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "throw up the sponge"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "From a custom of the boxing ring, the person employed to sponge a pugilist between rounds throwing his sponge in the air in token of defeat.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "throws up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "throwing up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "threw up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "thrown up the sponge",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "throw<,,threw,thrown> up the sponge"
      },
      "expansion": "throw up the sponge (third-person singular simple present throws up the sponge, present participle throwing up the sponge, simple past threw up the sponge, past participle thrown up the sponge)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English intransitive verbs",
        "English lemmas",
        "English light verb constructions",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English slang",
        "English terms with archaic senses",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "English verbs",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1870, James Russell Lowell, “Lessing”, in Among My Books, Boston, Mass.: Fields, Osgood, & Co., →OCLC, page 330:",
          "text": "But he was too brave a man to throw up the sponge to fate, and had work to do yet.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To give up a contest; to acknowledge defeat; to throw in the towel."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "give up",
          "give up"
        ],
        [
          "contest",
          "contest#Noun"
        ],
        [
          "acknowledge",
          "acknowledge"
        ],
        [
          "defeat",
          "defeat#Noun"
        ],
        [
          "throw in the towel",
          "throw in the towel"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(intransitive, idiomatic, slang, archaic) To give up a contest; to acknowledge defeat; to throw in the towel."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "archaic",
        "idiomatic",
        "intransitive",
        "slang"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-throw up the sponge.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/8/84/En-au-throw_up_the_sponge.ogg/En-au-throw_up_the_sponge.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/En-au-throw_up_the_sponge.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "throw up the sponge"
}

Download raw JSONL data for throw up the sponge meaning in All languages combined (2.1kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-12-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-11-21 using wiktextract (95d2be1 and 64224ec). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.