dilate

What it means

1. transitiveTo enlarge; to make bigger.

   The eye doctor put drops in my eye to dilate the pupil so he could see the nerve better.

2. intransitiveTo become wider or larger; to expand.

   His heart dilates and glories in his strength.

   Antonyms: contract

3. ambitransitiveTo speak largely and copiously; to dwell in narration; to enlarge; with "on" or "upon".

   But still they on their ancient joys dilate.

   1810, George Crabbe, The Borough

   2 more examples

   Do me the favour to dilate at full / What hath befallen of them and thee till now.

   c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]

   Houellebecq’s men[…] dilate lovingly upon the makes and models of cars and appliances, and the subsidiary brands of hospitality and conglomerates.

   2024 October 24, Judith Shulevitz, “Michel Houellebecq Has Some Fresh Predictions. Be Afraid.”, in The Atlantic

In a sentence

The eye doctor put drops in my eye to dilate the pupil so he could see the nerve better.

Where it comes from

1. Latindīlātō
2. Old Frenchdilater
3. Middle Englishdilaten
4. Englishdilate

First attested in 1393, in Middle English; inherited from Middle English dilaten, from Old French dilater, from Latin dīlātō (“to spread out”), from dī- + lātus (“wide”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix). Doublet of dilatate.