NATURALIZE

domesticate, cultivate, naturalize, naturalise, tame

(verb) adapt (a wild plant or unclaimed land) to the environment; “domesticate oats”; “tame the soil”

naturalize, naturalise

(verb) make into a citizen; “The French family was naturalized last year”

naturalize, naturalise

(verb) make more natural or lifelike

naturalize, naturalise

(verb) adopt to another place; “The stories had become naturalized into an American setting”

naturalize

(verb) explain with reference to nature

Source: WordNet® 3.1


Etymology

Verb

naturalize (third-person singular simple present naturalizes, present participle naturalizing, simple past and past participle naturalized)

To grant citizenship to someone not born a citizen

To acclimatize an animal or plant

To make natural

To limit explanations of a phenomenon to naturalistic ones and exclude supernatural ones

(linguistics) To make (a word) a natural part of the language.

To study nature.

Antonyms

• supernaturalize

Source: Wiktionary


Nat"u*ral*ize, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Naturalized; p. pr. & vb. n. Naturalizing.] Etym: [Cf. F. naturaliser. See Natural.]

1. To make natural; as, custom naturalizes labor or study.

2. To confer the rights and privileges of a native subject or citizen on; to make as if native; to adopt, as a foreigner into a nation or state, and place in the condition of a native subject.

3. To receive or adopt as native, natural, or vernacular; to make one's own; as, to naturalize foreign words.

4. To adapt; to accustom; to habituate; to acclimate; to cause to grow as under natural conditions. Its wearer suggested that pears and peaches might yet be naturalized in the New England climate. Hawthorne.

Nat"u*ral*ize, v. i.

1. To become as if native.

2. To explain phenomena by natural agencies or laws, to the exclusion of the supernatural. Infected by this naturalizing tendency. H. Bushnell.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition



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Word of the Day

5 June 2025

UNDERLAY

(verb) raise or support (the level of printing) by inserting a piece of paper or cardboard under the type; “underlay the plate”


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Coffee Trivia

According to Guinness World Records, the largest iced coffee is 14,228.1 liters and was created by Caffé Bene (South Korea), in Yangju, South Korea, on 17 July 2014. They poured iced black Americano on the giant cup that measured 3.3 meters tall and 2.62 meters wide.

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