Dies

Part of speech: verb

Pronunciation: /daɪz/

Definitions

1. The cessation of biological functions leading to the end of life occurs
2. Undergoes the end of life processes and permanent stoppage of vital functions ; terminates its active operation or performance
3. Experiences the permanent loss of biological activity and life ; halts its normal working or activity, resulting in shutdown

Etymology: "Dies" is the third-person singular of "die", the verb that has passed from Old Norse into English. Middle English "deyen" likely came from the Old Norse "deyja", which goes back to a Proto-Germanic root meaning "to die". The surprise is that English once had its own native verbs for this. Old English "sweltan" survives today only as the modern "swelt", and "steorfan" became "starve", which originally meant to die of any cause, not specifically of hunger. The Norse word pushed these aside and took over the general sense. Those native words are no longer the story for "dies" itself. The same spelling, however, belongs to a second and older word: a die in the sense of a cube for gambling. Its Middle English form "dee" came from Old French "de", from Latin "datum", meaning "given", the same root that gives English "date" and "datum". The Latin "tessella" also gave Old English "tasul" and "tesul", meaning die or cube, though those were replaced by the French-derived word.

Synonyms: expires, perishes, deceases

Antonyms: lives, survives, thrives