Restore

Part of speech: verb

Pronunciation: /ɹɪˈstɔː/

Definitions

1. To bring something back to its original or proper condition after damage or decline
2. To return an object or system to a prior, functional state after it has suffered loss, damage, or decline
3. To reinstate something to a former state or position by repairing, renewing, or replacing what has been lost or impaired

Etymology: Latin "restaurare" meant "to renew, rebuild, or make good again," and it was built from "re-" (again, back) and a verb "staurare" or "instaurare" meaning "to establish." That older root means the word was never just about returning something to where it was; it carried a sense of setting something up firmly once more. The English verb "restore" is a surprisingly indirect descendant of it: it came into Middle English from Old French "restorer," so the word arrived already polished by centuries of French use. The English form is a simple combination of "re-" and "store," but the apparent link is misleading. "Store" comes from a different Latin source, "instaurare" only ancestrally, so the familiar pairing of "re-" with "store" is an accident of surface resemblance. Readers who think "restore" means "put back into storage" are reading the word through a coincidence, not its actual history.

Synonyms: bring back, reestablish, revive, repair, renovate

Antonyms: destroy, damage, dismantle