divide

present singular third person divides · participle present dividing · participle past divided · past divided · first person past singular divided · archaic present second person singular dividest · past second person singular divided · archaic past second person singular dividedst · present singular third person divides · archaic present singular third person divideth · past singular third person divided · past plural divided · past subjunctive divided · participle present dividing · participle past divided

1. transitiveTo split or separate (something) into two or more parts.

   a wall divides two houses; a stream divides the towns

   1 more example

   Divide the living child in two.

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Kings 3:25

   Synonyms: cut up, disunite, partition, split, split up · Antonyms: combine, merge, unify, unite

2. intransitiveTo separate into two or more parts.

   Synonyms: separate, shear, split, split up

3. transitiveTo share (something) by dividing it.

   How shall we divide this pie?

   1 more example

   true justice unto people to divide

   1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 1

   Synonyms: divvy up, divide up, share, share out, apportion

4. transitiveTo cause (a group of people) to disagree.

   Words divide us; Wiktionary unites us.

   2 more examples

   For nearly two years, the pandemic has been dividing families over issues like social distancing, mask-wearing, and vaccines. Now that the holiday season is here and families are gathering, many issues that have been simmering are reaching a boiling point.

   2021 December 15, “Has the Pandemic Torn Your Family Apart?”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 12 Dec 2022

   It is a debate that divides Americans as evenly as any of the great political issues of the day. Should they leave their butter on the counter, or must they keep it in the fridge?

   2023 April 29, Will Pavia, “Why butter must come out of the fridge”, in The Times, London: News UK, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 28 Apr 2023

5. transitivearithmeticTo calculate the quotient number by which another one (the divisor) is multiplied to produce a second number (the dividend).

   If you divide 6 by 3, you get 2.

   1 more example

   I could add and subtract and multiply and divide, but I entered the wilderness when words became equations.

   2022 August 7, Alec Wilkinson, “Could learning algebra in my 60s make me smarter?”, in The Guardian, archived from the original on 22 Mar 2023

   Antonyms: multiply

6. transitivearithmeticTo be a divisor of.

   3 divides 6.

7. intransitivebiologyTo reproduce by either mitosis or meiosis.

   1 more example

   [The researchers] noticed many of their pieces of [plastic marine] debris sported surface pits around two microns across. Such pits are about the size of a bacterial cell. Closer examination showed that some of these pits did, indeed, contain bacteria, and that in several cases these bacteria were dividing and thus, by the perverse arithmetic of biological terminology, multiplying.

   2013 July 20, “Welcome to the plastisphere”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845

8. intransitiveTo disunite in opinion or interest; to make discordant or hostile; to set at variance.

   Every family became now divided within itself.

   1838, William H[ickling] Prescott, History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Boston, Mass.: American Stationers’ Company; John B. Russell, →OCLC

   1 more example

   If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Mark 3:24

9. intransitiveobsoleteTo break friendship; to fall out.

   love cools, friendship / falls off, brothers divide.

   1605, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of King Lear, I. ii. 107

10. obsoleteTo have a share; to partake.

    Make good this ostentation, and you shall / Divide in all with us.

    1608, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Coriolanus, I. vi. 87

11. intransitiveparliamentary jargonTo vote, as in the British parliament and other legislatures, by the members separating themselves into two parties (as on opposite sides of the hall or in opposite lobbies), that is, the ayes dividing from the nays.

    The debates were conducted with decent freedom; and the emperors themselves, who gloried in the name of senators, sat, voted, and divided with their equals.

    1776, Edward Gibbon, “Chapter III: The Constitution In The Age Of The Antonines.—Part I.”, in The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume I, London: […] W[illiam] Strahan; and T[homas] Cadell, […], →OCLC, page 69

12. transitiveTo split (something) into regular steps or intervals; to mark with degrees; to graduate.

    to divide a sextant

13. entertainmentTo play or sing in a florid style, or with variations.

    About the bed sweet musicke did divide

    1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC

plural divides

1. A thing that divides.

   Stay on your side of the divide, please.

2. An act of dividing.

   The divide left most of the good land on my share of the property.

   1 more example

   The extended instruction set may double the speed again if a lot of multiplies and divides are done.

   1975, Byte, numbers 1-8, page 14

3. A distancing between two people or things.

   There is a great divide between us.

   1 more example

   Republicans and Democrats interpret individualism differently, and those divides are more pronounced than ever in our deeply polarized political climate.

   2020 May 19, Scottie Andrew, “America’s response to the coronavirus is the most American thing ever”, in CNN, archived from the original on 29 Jul 2020

4. geographyA large chasm, gorge, or ravine between two areas of land.

   If you're heading to the coast, you'll have to cross the divide first.

   2 more examples

   The team crossed streams and jumped across deep, narrow divides in the glacier.

   Carrying light packs they left camp at daylight the next morning. Trails there were none; but they followed the general course of a small creek, crossed a divide, and dipped down into a beautifully timbered valley watered by a swift, large creek of almost riverlike dimensions.

   1922, A. M. Chisholm, A Thousand a Plate

5. geographyThe topographical boundary dividing two adjacent catchment basins, such as a ridge or a crest.