UNDO • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Undo

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/əndˈu/ Listen

verb

Undo v. t. (past undid; past part. undone; pres. part. undoing)

To reverse, as what has been done; to annul; to bring to naught. "What's done can not be undone." "To-morrow, ere the setting sun, She 'd all undo that she had done."

To loose; to open; to take to piece; to unfasten; to untie; hence, to unravel; to solve; as, to undo a knot; to undo a puzzling question; to undo a riddle. "Pray you, undo this button." "She took the spindle, and undoing the thread gradually, measured it."

To bring to poverty; to impoverish; to ruin, as in reputation, morals, hopes, or the like; as, many are undone by unavoidable losses, but more undo themselves by vices and dissipation, or by indolence. "That quaffing and drinking will undo you,"

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Etymology of 'Undo'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Undo" Quotes from Famous Books

... bacterium can produce alone. Other observers have brought forward other cases. Thus neither B. coli nor the B. denitrificans of Burri and Stutzer can reduce nitrates, but if acting together they so completely undo the structure of sodium nitrate that the nitrogen passes off in the free state. Van Senus showed that the concurrence of two bacteria is necessary before his B. amylobacter can ferment cellulose, and the case of mud bacteria which evolve ...

— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various

... silence! What to do? How hide this speechless witness from men's gaze? Living, that body vexed us; being dead 'T is like to give us trouble and to spare. O for a cavern in deep-bowelled earth! Quick, ere the dusky petals of the night Unclosing bare the fiery heart of dawn And thus undo us with its garish light, Let us this mute and pale accusing clay In some undreamed-of sepulchre bestow, But where? Hold back thy fleet-wing'd coursers, Time, Whilst we bethink us! Ah—such place there is! Close, too, at hand—a place wherein a man Might lie till doomsday safer ...

— Wyndham Towers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... who Unlocks not fate to mortal's prayer. Hard lot! Yet light their griefs who BEAR The ills which they may not undo. ...

— Verses and Translations • C. S. C.

... enforced him mickle to undo the door. Then he listened and heard a voice which sang so sweetly that it seemed none earthly thing; and him thought the voice said: Joy and honour be to the Father of Heaven. Then Launcelot kneeled down ...

— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume II (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory

... a knot by which the yoke was fastened to the beam of the chariot of Gordius (q. v.), and which no one could untie except the man who was destined to be the conqueror of Asia; Alexander the Great being ambitious to achieve this feat, tried hard to undo it, but failing, cut it with his sword ...

— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

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