give

I gave him my coat.

I gave my coat to the beggar.

When they asked, I gave my coat.

(ditransitive) To move, shift, provide something abstract or concrete to someone or something or somewhere.

To transfer one's possession or holding of (something) to (someone).

I'm going to give my wife a necklace for her birthday.

She gave a pair of shoes to her husband for their anniversary.

I gave him my word that I'd protect his children.

I gave them permission to miss tomorrow's class.

Please give me some more time.

To provide (something) to (someone), to allow or afford.

To provide (something) to (someone), to allow or afford.

It gives me a lot of pleasure to be here tonight.

The fence gave me an electric shock.

My mother-in-law gives me nothing but grief.

it's giving me bad vibes — It's giving me old Hollywood (vibes)

"The outfit is giving me eighties fitness video vibes, but you wear it well."

2023 February 21, Lakita Wilson, Last Chance Dance, Penguin, →ISBN, page 81:

To cause (a sensation or feeling) to exist in (the specified person, or the target, audience, etc).

it's giving old Hollywood (vibes)

[subtitle:] It's giving Wednesday Addams at the salon...

2022 October 25, Medina Azaldin, ELLE Beauty Team, “30 Halloween Nail Art Trends To Get You In The Mood For Trick Or Treat”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name):

It's giving old Hollywood

2023 May 30, Sophie Williams, “Kylie Jenner is giving Marilyn Monroe vibes in her latest Instagram post”, in Cosmopolitan, New York, N.Y.: Hearst Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-09-10:

Your outfit is giving more romance than bloodshed. Are you currently in love?

2023 June 12, Wilson Wong, “Gov Ball Raves on in Pink, Amid Rain and Smoke”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-06-12:

This outfit gives 'college girl that knows what she's doing' and even though I am the furthest from that, I'll take it.

2023 July 20, Rachel Krause, quoting Gabby Ragsdale, “4 Students On The Back-To-School Outfits They're Shopping Their Closets For”, in Refinery29, archived from the original on 2023-09-10:

(slang, transitive) To give off (a certain vibe or appearance). (Compare giving.)

I want to give you a kiss.

She gave him a hug.

I'd like to give the tire a kick.

I gave the boy a push on the swing.

She gave me a wink afterwards, so I knew she was joking.

Then came a maid with hand-bag and shawls, and after her a tall young lady. She stood for a moment holding her skirt above the grimy steps, with something of the stately pose which Richter has given his Queen Louise on the stairway,[…].

1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, page 68:

To carry out (a physical interaction) with (something).

To carry out (a physical interaction) with (something).

Give me your hand.

On entering the house, he gave his coat to the doorman.

To pass (something) into (someone's hand, etc.).

To pass (something) into (someone's hand, etc.).

My boyfriend gave me chlamydia.

He was convinced that it was his alcoholism that gave him cancer.

Study gives strength to the mind; conversation, grace: the first apt to give stiffness, the other suppleness: one gives substance and form to the statue, the other polishes it.

a. 1700 (date written), William Temple, “Heads, Designed for an Essay on Conversation”, in Miscellanea. The Third Part. […], London: […] Jonathan Swift, […] Benjamin Tooke, […], published 1701, →OCLC, page 331:

To cause (a disease or condition) in, or to transmit (a disease or condition) to.

The doctors gave me morphine for the pain.

They're giving my favorite show!

We hope that the need to "give good e-mail" in response to questions from clients and potential clients will in fact induce firms to get serious about storing and reusing their expertise – and even become open to tailoring […]

[…]who did not have a culture in which 'giving good presentation' and successfully playing the internal political game was the way up.

2003, Iain Aitken, Value-Driven IT Management: Commercializing the IT Function, page 153:

A friendly voice on the phone welcoming prospective new clients is a must. Don't underestimate the importance of giving good "phone".

2006, Christopher Matthew Spencer, The Ebay Entrepreneur, page 248:

Social skills are required to meet new people in a chat room and maintain contact over time (“Do you give good e-mail?”). The Internet provides people with an opportunity to reinvent or misrepresent themselves.

2012 January 1, George Zinkan, Advertising Research: The Internet, Consumer Behavior, and Strategy, Marketing Classics Press, →ISBN, page 28:

He gives good face too, posing for the camera with hands on waist, eyes forward, legs crossed (Fig. 4.1).

2016 November 25, Gabrielle Jamela Hosein, Lisa Outar, Indo-Caribbean Feminist Thought: Genealogies, Theories, Enactments, Springer, →ISBN, page 54:

(transitive) To provide, as, a service or a broadcast.

To provide, as, a service or a broadcast.

I give it ten minutes before he gives up.

I'd give it a 95% chance of success.

I'll give their marriage six months.

(ditransitive) To estimate or predict (a duration or probability) for (something).

A soldier noticed how earth "gave" as he walked over the shallow trenches.

1992, Garry Wills, “prologue”, in Lincoln at Gettysburg, page 21:

One pillar gave, then more, and suddenly the whole floor pancaked onto the floor below.

(intransitive) To yield or collapse under pressure or force.

To yield or collapse under pressure or force.

The master bedroom gives onto a spacious balcony.

Beyond the stile stands an attractive row of riverside trees – alder, hazel, beech, hawthorn and ash. Go across to the far corner of a field, where a through-stile gives onto a small, lightly wooded hill,[…]

2022 February 3, Terry Marsh, Walking the Dales Way: Ilkley to Bowness-on-Windermere through the Yorkshire Dales, Cicerone Press Limited, →ISBN:

His window gave the park.

Columbus dwellers of Woodland Meadow Apts may not find themselves in a perfectly bucolic setting, as the residential complex gives onto a military defense logistics ground.

2006, Pierre Lagayette, Nature et progrès: interactions, exclusions, mutations, Presses Paris Sorbonne, →ISBN, page 61:

(transitive, dated) To provide a view of.

The number of men, divided by the number of ships, gives four hundred to each ship.

To exhibit as a product or result; to produce; to yield.

But there the duke was given to understand / That in a gondola were seen together / Lorenzo and his amorous Jessica.

c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene viii], page 171:

To cause; to make; used with the infinitive.

"Can do" gives me a choice, while "should do" gives me a complex.

1997, Jim Smoke, How a Man Measures Success, page 82:

To cause (someone) to have; produce in (someone); effectuate.

He can be bad-tempered, I'll give you that, but he's a hard worker.

I give not heaven for lost.

1667, John Milton, “Book II”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:

To allow or admit by way of supposition; to concede.

I don't wonder at people giving him to me for a lover.

1777, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, page 6:

The umpire finally gave his decision: the ball was out.

To communicate or announce (advice, tidings, etc.); to pronounce or utter (an opinion, a judgment, a shout, etc.).

These are the statutes and judgments, which ye shall observe to do in the land, which the Lord God of thy fathers giveth thee to possess it, all the days that ye live upon the earth.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Deuteronomy 12:1:

once again
'Tis given me to behold my friend.

1700, Nicholas Rowe, The Ambitious Stepmother, page 13:

Then give thy friend to shed the sacred wine.

1725, Homer, “Book III”, in [Alexander Pope], transl., The Odyssey of Homer. […], volume I, London: […] Bernard Lintot, →OCLC:

(dated or religion) To grant power, permission, destiny, etc. (especially to a person); to allot; to allow.

The soldiers give themselves to plunder.

That boy is given to fits of bad temper.

(reflexive) To devote or apply (oneself).

Some moyst weather hath‥caused the powder to give and danke.

1590, John Smyth, A Discourse […] concerning […] weapons:

Whose eyes do never give / But through lust and laughter.

c. 1605–1608, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii], page 94:

My mind gives ye're reserv'd / To rob poor market women.

c. 1608-1634, John Webster, Appius and Virginia, page 16

en-verb

give (third-person singular simple present gives, present participle giving, simple past gave, past participle given)

gives (present singular third-person)
giving (participle present)
gave (past)
given (participle past)
give (infinitive)

give a man a fish and you feed him for a day

teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime

give him enough rope and he'll hang himself

give someone an inch and someone will take a mile

give them an inch and they'll take a mile

give them an inch and they'll take an ell

give with one hand and take away with the other

besi amo

transfer the possession of something to someone else

From Middle English given, from Old Norse gefa (“to give”), from Proto-Germanic *gebaną (“to give”). Merged with native Middle English yiven, ȝeven, from Old English ġiefan, from the same Proto-Germanic source (compare the obsolete inherited English doublet yive).


give

This chair doesn't have much give.

There is no give in his dogmatic religious beliefs.

The striker's job was onerous, too, because there was so little "give" in the metal, and the perpetual jarring was indeed trying to the muscles.

1945 January and February, A Former Pupil, “Some Memories of Crewe Works—III”, in Railway Magazine, page 13:

The amount of bending that something undergoes when a force is applied to it; a tendency to yield under pressure; resilience.