love

plural loves · alternative obsolete loue · alternative Internet luv

1. uncountableA deep caring for the existence of another.
2. Strong affection.
   1. countableuncountableA profound and caring affection towards someone.

      My love for Melca is eternal.

      4 more examples

      A mother’s love is not easily shaken.

      My husband’s love is the most important thing in my life.

      He on his side / Leaning half-raised, with looks of cordial love / Hung over her enamoured.

      1674, John Milton, Paradise Lost

      A beautiful girl came out on the balcony with her lover. “How wonderful the stars are,” he said to her, “and how wonderful is the power of love!”

      1888, Oscar Wilde, “The Happy Prince”, in The Happy Prince and Other Tales, London: Duckworth, published 1928, page 23

      Antonyms: hate, hatred, angst, indifference

   2. countableuncountableAffectionate, benevolent concern or care for other people or beings, and for their well-being.

      The love of your neighbor as yourself, is expressly given as the definition and test of Charity,—not alms-giving—and this love is … the highest of all the Divine commands[.]

      1864, Utilitarianism Explained and Exemplified in Moral and Political Government

      1 more example

      Through nonviolent resistance we shall be able to oppose the unjust system and at the same time love the perpetrators of the system. We must work passionately and unrelentingly for full stature as citizens, but may it never be said, my friends, that to gain it we used the inferior methods of falsehood, malice, hate, and violence.

      1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., “A Tough Mind and a Tender Heart”, in Strength to Love, New York: Pocket Books, published 1964, →OCLC, page 7

      Antonyms: hate, hatred, angst, indifference

   3. countableuncountableA feeling of intense attraction towards someone.

      I have never been in love as much as I have with you.

      2 more examples

      Heav'n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd, / Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman ſcorn'd.

      1697, [William] Congreve, The Mourning Bride, a Tragedy. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, Act III, page 39

      The humor of my proposition appealed more strongly to Miss Trevor than I had looked for, and from that time forward she became her old self again; for, even after she had conquered her love for the Celebrity, the mortification of having been jilted by him remained.

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

      Antonyms: hate, hatred, angst, indifference

   4. countableuncountableA deep or abiding liking for something; an enthusiasm for something.

      My love of cricket knows no bounds.

      1 more example

      For three decades, the average number of miles driven by US motorists increased steadily. Then, in 2007, that steady climb was suddenly halted. [...] What magic caused Americans to temper their longstanding love of the open road?

      2012, Philip Auerswald, The Coming Prosperity, →ISBN

      Antonyms: hate, hatred, angst, indifference

3. countableA person who is the object of romantic feelings; a darling, a sweetheart, a beloved.

   Open the temple gates unto my love.

   1595, Edmund Spenser, Epithalamion

   3 more examples

   O love, dispatch all business, and be gone!

   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 III, scene ii]

   'Oh, my love, my love!' she murmured, 'wilt thou ever know how I have loved thee?' and she kissed him on the forehead, and then went and stood in the pathway of the flame of Life.

   1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC

   I met my love by the gasworks wall.

   1969, The Dubliners, Dirty Old Town

   Synonyms: baby, darling, honey, lover, pet, sweetheart, babber, babe

4. CommonwealthcolloquialcountableuncountableA term of friendly address, regardless of feelings.

   Hello love, how can I help you?

   Synonyms: mate, darling, lovey, sweetie, sweetheart

5. countableuncountableA thing, activity, etc. which is the object of one's deep liking or enthusiasm.

   But it wasn't until [Theresa M. Claiborne] went to ROTC training camp at the University of California at Berkeley that she discovered that flying was her first love. "Pilots talk about getting bit by the flying bug," she says. "I thought, This is heaven."

   1997 March, “Faces of Today's Black Woman”, in Ebony, volume 52, number 5, page 96

6. countableeuphemisticuncountableSexual desire; attachment based on sexual attraction.

   The prospect that their cherished Greeks would have countenanced, much less honored, a love between men that expressed itself carnally, however, was not so easily assimilated.

   2013, Ronald Long, Men, Homosexuality, and the Gods, Routledge, →ISBN, page 3

   Synonyms: aphrodisia, carnality, aphrodisia, carnality, colt's tooth, concupiscence, the hots, lech

7. countableeuphemisticuncountableSexual activity.

   —What think you, my lord, of... love? —You mean ‘rumpy-pumpy’.

   1986, Ben Elton et al., “Bells”, in Blackadder II

   Synonyms: lovemaking, sex, aphrodisia, carnal knowledge, coitus, coition, commerce, commixtion

8. countableuncountableAn instance or episode of being in love; a love affair.

   Maybe it was just a summer love, something with no future.

   2014, E. L. Todd, Then Came Absolution, →ISBN

   Synonyms: romance

9. countableuncountableUsed as the closing, before the signature, of a letter, especially between good friends or family members, or by the young.
10. countableuncountableAlternative letter-case form of Love (“personification of love”).

    At busy hearts in vain love's arrows fly; …

    c. 1810, Samuel Johnson (in The Works of Samuel Johnson)

11. countableobsoleteuncountableA thin silk material.

    Such a kind of transparency, as that of a Sive, a piece of Cyprus, or a Love-Hood.

    1664, Robert Boyle, Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours, […]

12. countableuncountableA climbing plant, Clematis vitalba.
13. countableobsoleteuncountableTyndale Bible; also puristic; Tyndale Bible; also puristicCharity.

present singular third person loves · participle present loving · participle past loved · past loved · first person past singular loved · archaic present second person singular lovest · past second person singular loved · archaic past second person singular lovedst · present singular third person loves · archaic present singular third person loveth · past singular third person loved · past plural loved · past subjunctive loved · participle present loving · participle past loved · alternative obsolete loue

1. intransitivesometimesstativetransitiveusuallyTo have a strong affection for (someone or something).

   I love my spouse. I love you! I love that song!

   2 more examples

   wanted to take her in my arms and tell her how I loved her, and had taken her hand from the rail and started to draw her toward me when Olson came blundering up on deck with his bedding.

   1918 September–November, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Land That Time Forgot”, in The Blue Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: Story-press Corp., →OCLC; republished as chapter VI, in Hugo Gernsback, editor, Amazing Stories, (please specify |part=I to III), New York, N.Y.: Experimenter Publishing, 1927, →OCLC

   Just give me a reason, / just a little bit's enough, / just a second we're not broken, just bent / and we can learn to love again.

   2013 February 26, Pink, Nate Ruess, Just Give Me a Reason

   Synonyms: adore

2. transitiveTo need, thrive on.

   Mold loves moist, dark places.

3. transitiveTo be strongly inclined towards something; an emphatic form of like.

   I love walking barefoot on wet grass; I'd love to join the team; I love what you've done with your hair

   2 more examples

   "I love not that underlings should perceive my wisdom."

   1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC

   “Everywhere he went, I went with him. When I was twenty-three, I had been nearly all over the world. It was a splendid life—I loved it.”

   1920, Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, London: Pan Books, published 1954, page 141

4. intransitivesometimestransitiveusuallyTo seek the good or honor of (someone), care deeply about, to be dedicated to (someone or something).

   For God so loued þe world, that he gaue his only begotten Sonne: that whosoeuer beleeueth in him, should not perish, but haue euerlasting life.

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, John 3:16

   1 more example

   Iesus sayd vnto him, Thou shalt loue the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soule, and with all thy minde. This is the first and great Commandement. And the second is like vnto it, Thou shalt loue thy neighbour as thy selfe.

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew 22:37–39

5. ironicsometimestransitiveTo derive delight from a fact or situation.

   I love the fact that the coffee shop now offers fat-free chai latte.

6. InternetSynonym of heart (verb).

   She loved my photos of the kids playing with the dogs.

   Synonyms: heart

7. euphemistictransitiveTo have sex with (perhaps from make love).

   I wish I could love her all night long.

   Synonyms: enjoy

alternative obsolete loue · alternative Internet luv

1. uncountableball gamesZero, no score.

   So that’s fifteen-love to Kournikova.

   1 more example

   The next day Agassi came back from two sets to love down to beat Courier in five sets.

   2013, Paul McNamee, Game Changer: My Tennis Life

2. uncountableNothing; no recompense.

   I fought the white man for less than sixpence. I fought him for love, which is nothing at all.

   1916, H. Rider Haggard, The Ivory Child

present singular third person loves · participle present loving · participle past loved · past loved · alternative obsolete loue · alternative Internet luv

1. alternativeAlternative form of lofe (“to praise, sell”).

   Synonyms: adore, cherish

1. World War II era; joint US/RAF; World War II era; joint US/RAFradiotelephony clear-code word for the letter L.

   Synonyms: Lima

plural Loves

1. countableuncountableA surname.

   Elisheva Baskin and Michael Stein are to be married Sunday evening at the Palisadium, an event space in Cliffside Park, N.J. Rabbi Yaacov Love is to officiate.

   2013 July 26, “Elisheva Baskin and Michael Stein”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 29 Jul 2013

2. countableuncountableA male given name.
3. countableuncountableA female given name.
4. countableuncountableCupid, Eros, or another personification of love.

   To Hymen's bower young Cupid came, And each with each was quite delighted; Love shot his dart of surest aim, And Hymen's brightest torch was lighted.

   1897, “The Quarrel of Love and Hymen”, in Choicest Lyrics from the Realms of Love, page 99

5. countableuncountableAn unincorporated community in Butler County, Kentucky.

1. slanglifestyleThe ship of characters Logan Echolls and Veronica Mars from the television show Veronica Mars.

   “LoVe” (Logan/Veronica) was a very rapid OTP (one true pairing) candidate.

   2018, Ivan Askwith, quoted in The Routledge Companion to Media Fandom (Melissa A. Click & Suzanne Scott), unnumbered page

   2 more examples

   The complicated and, for fans, mostly frustrating relationship between these characters is the reason why stories dealing with Spuffy and LoVe pairings are by far more popular than stories based on any other possible ship.

   2008, Manuela Scherf, "Character Formation in Fan Fiction Based on Popular TV Series, thesis submitted to the University of Vienna, page 15

   Though all but two of my informants eventually self-identified as LoVe shippers—Eileen and Jodie were vocally opposed to the relationship, characterizing it as abusive—all were initially unwilling to involve that investment in their answers to my questions.

   2018, Annemarie Navar-Gill, “Fandom as symbolic patronage: expanding understanding of fan relationships with industry through the Veronica Mars Kickstarter campaign”, in Popular Communication: The International Journal of Media and Culture, volume 16, number 3