submerge, v.
(səbˈmɜːdʒ)
[ad. L. submergĕre, var. of summergĕre: see sub- 2 and merge. Cf. F. submerger, It. sommergere, Sp., Pg. sumergir.]
1. pass. To be covered with water; to be sunk under water.
| 1606 Shakes. Ant. & Cl. ii. v. 94 So halfe my Egypt were submerg'd and made A Cesterne for scal'd Snakes. 1688 Luttrell Brief Rel. (1857) I. 453 That the island of Madera's..had been destroyed by an earthquake and submerg'd in the sea. 1794 R. J. Sulivan View Nat. II. 430 Those lost people, whom we have supposed to have been submerged, when the present face of things was drawn into existence. 1833 Lyell Princ. Geol. III. 116 Tracts that may be submerged or variously altered in depth. 1853 Kane Grinnell Exp. xxxix. (1856) 359 The white whale..whistled, while submerged and swimming under our brig. 1877 Huxley Physiogr. 212 The remains of a vast forest..now submerged to a depth of perhaps twenty or thirty feet below high-water. 1880 Dawkins Early Man in Brit. i. 1 He tells of continents submerged, and of ocean bottoms lifted up to become mountains. |
| fig. a 1625 Beaum. & Fl. Love's Cure v. iii, Many of his chief Gentry..spoyld, lost, and submerged in the impious inundation and torrent of their still-growing malice. 1856 Vaughan Mystics (1860) I. 98 The miserable monks..whose minds submerged in the ‘mare tenebrosum’ of the cloister, [etc.]. 1903 Myers Hum. Pers. I. p. xxi, Faculty, which is kept thus submerged, not by its own weakness, but by the constitution of man's personality. |
2. trans. To cause to sink or plunge into water; to place under water.
| 1611 Cotgr., Submerger, to submerge; to plunge or sinke vnder, whirken or ouerwhelme by,..the water. 1726 Bailey, To Submerge, to bend a Thing very low, to drown or dip. 1817 Kirby & Sp. Entomol. (1818) II. 212 Experimentalists may.., without danger, submerge a hive of bees, when they want to examine them particularly. 1870 Yeats Nat. Hist. Comm. 91 The shallow and tideless Baltic has scarcely a sounding that could submerge St. Paul's Cathedral. |
| fig. 1855 Bain Senses & Int. ii. ii. §19 (1864) 144 The magnitude of the sensation is attested by its power to submerge a great many irritations. 1907 Forsyth Posit. Preaching iv. 124 Our demands must never be submerged by our sympathies. |
3. intr. To sink or plunge under water; to undergo submersion.
| 1652 Kirkman Clerio & Lozia 123 A Cork sometimes elevateth it self, and then submergeth under the water. 1808 Gentl. Mag. LXXVIII. 670/2 Some say, they [sc. swallows] submerge in ponds. 1823 J. Badcock Dom. Amusem. 208 The ascending wires (where they submerge)..should be flattish at the sides. 1863 Ld. Lytton Ring of Amasis I. 48 He submerged, and we lost sight of him. 1903 A. H. Burgoyne Submarine Navigation II. 162 Having reached the ‘limit of visibility’ it becomes necessary to submerge. 1915 Glasgow Herald 30 Mar. 8 In the vicinity of the enemy or when weather conditions make it necessary we submerge. 1930 W. Faulkner As I lay Dying 146 We submerge in turn, holding to the rope, being clutched by one another. 1958 J. Lewis in C. S. Lewis Lett. to Amer. Lady (1969) 72 He comes up for air now and then, blows a few pathetic bubbles, then submerges again. 1974 P. Lovesey Invitation to Dynamite Party xiv. 172 Put the boat in diving trim... To submerge, push down the ballast-levers. |
| fig. 1837 Carlyle Fr. Rev. ii. iii. iv, Plot after plot, emerging and submerging, like ignes fatui in foul weather. Ibid. iii. ii. v, This Question of the Trial..emerged and submerged among the infinite of questions and embroilments. |
Hence
subˈmerging vbl. n. and ppl. a.| 1882 Crommelin Brown-Eyes viii, Alluvial deposit left there ages ago by the submerging waters. 1888 Schaff Hist. Chr. Ch., Mod. Chr. 219 Faith is the submerging of the old man, and the emerging of the new man. 1902 Daily Chron. 5 Apr. 7/6 The submerging was accomplished in 6 sec. |