▪ I. combine, v.
(kəmˈbaɪn)
Forms: 5–6 combyne(n, 6– combine.
[a. F. combine-r (14th c. in Littré), ad. late L. combīnāre to join two by two, yoke together, f. com- + bīnī two together; perh. the Eng. was formed directly from the Latin.]
1. trans. To couple or join two or more things together: † a. material things in material union.
| c 1440 Promp. Parv. 88 Combynyn, or copulyn..combino, copulo. 1599 A. M. tr. Gabelhouer's Bk. Physicke 308/2 A Synue cut a sunder..and how the Chirurgione shoulde combine agayne the same. 1616 Bullokar, Combine, to couple or joyne together. |
b. persons or material things in non-material or ideal union: To join in action, condition, or feeling; to conjoin, band together, associate, ally.
| 1503 More Ruful Lamentation (R.), The faithful loue, that dyd vs both combyne. 1593 R. Bancroft Dangerous Positions iii. xvi. 131 They haue combined themselues together into a strange brotherhood. 1599 Shakes. Hen. V, v. ii. 388 God, the best maker of all Marriages, Combine your hearts in one, your Realmes in one. a 1677 Barrow Serm. Christ despised no man, Combining man to himself by the fresh cement of his precious blood. 1749 R. Hurd Comm. Horace Ars P. Note (R.), The art of combining woods, lakes, and rocks, into..agreeable pictures. 1818 Jas. Mill Brit. India II. v. i. 329 A sense of common danger might..combine them in operations of defence. 1853 Kingsley Hypatia xxii. 282 The youths and maidens combined themselves with the gentler animals into groups. |
c. things immaterial; esp. in to combine efforts, combine forces, etc.
| 1529 More Heresyes i. Wks. 112/1 Which two pointes, himselfe had combyned and knitte together. 1700 Dryden Pal. & Arc. iii. 1115 Ordain we then two sorrows to combine, And in one point the extremes of grief to join. 1732 Berkeley Alciphr. iii. §10 Every one's true interest is combined with his duty. 1862 Sir B. Brodie Psychol. Inq. II. v. 151 It is only to a limited extent that the education of children can be advantageously combined with bodily labour. 1876 J. H. Newman Hist. Sk. III. v. iii. 451 Known for combining sacred and classical studies in his monastery. |
† d. to combine a league. Obs.
| 1562 Phaër æneid ix. (R.), Old duke Cedicus..did combyne..freendly league with Remulus of Tyburt coast. |
e. With pronunc. (ˈkɒmbaɪn). To harvest (crops, etc.), by means of a combine (harvester). orig. U.S.
| 1926 Kansas City Star 23 June, The first wheat combined in this vicinity was from the 100-acre field of A. E. Rudd. 1957 Times 24 Aug. 4/7 Up to half the grain has been cut or combined in those regions. 1958 Listener 16 Oct. 593/2 There were cases of fields having to be cut by reaper, windrowed, and then combined—not a cheap way of harvesting. |
2. To cause to unite or coalesce into one body or substance; esp. in Chem.
| 1799 G. Smith Laborat. I. 5 To combine oil with sulphur. 1871 B. Stewart Heat §117 It generally exists combined..with some other liquid. |
3. To unite (distinct qualities); to possess or exhibit in union.
| 1827 Carlyle Misc. (1857) I. 49 Combining French clearness with old English depth. 1856 Stanley Sinai & Pal. v. (1858) 244 A position which..combined..strength, beauty, and fertility. 1875 Jevons Money (1878) 18 Some substance which will..combine the characters requisite for all the different functions of Money. |
4. intr. To come together into one body, coalesce; spec. in Chem. to enter into chemical union, unite by chemical affinity with. Cf. combination 6.
| 1712 Blackmore Creation iv, The scattering bodies never would combine, Nor to compose a world by concourse join. 1766 T. Amory J. Buncle (1825) III. 223 The mercury revivified, and the acid combined with it. 1800 tr. Lagrange's Chem. I. 139 The oxide of manganese..combines with the oxygen. 1812 Sir H. Davy Chem. Philos. 444 Silver combines with chlorine when..heated in contact with the gas. |
| fig. 1856 Froude Hist. Eng. I. 291 Their wisdom, if we may so use the word, combines crudely with any form of superstition or fanaticism. |
5. a. To unite together for a common purpose, to co-operate for some end; to confederate, form a union, spec. for some economic, social, or political purpose; to form a combination.
| [1529 Hen. VIII. in Fiddes Life Wolsey Collect. p. xxxiv, A great part of the youth..with contentious factions and manner, daily combineing together.] 1605 Shakes. Lear v. i. 29 Combine together 'gainst the Enemie. 1697 Dryden Virg. Georg. iv. 241 All..combine to drive The lazy Drones from the laborious Hive. 1722 Sewel Hist. Quakers (1795) II. vii. 18 Though the powers of darkness..combine against them. 1770 Burke Pres. Discont., When bad men combine, good men must associate. 1883 Law Rep. 11 Q.B. Div. 568 The parties combined to negotiate a loan contrary to the provisions of the Companies Act. 1890 Railway Herald 31 May 11/2 The Tradesmen, Miners and Dockers have sufficient strength..should they combine respectively. |
b. fig. of things.
| 1802 M. Edgeworth Moral T. (1816) I. xiii. 103 Their pride and their prejudices combined against him. 1814 Southey Roderick xxiii, The forms of piety and war, In strange but fitting union must combine. 1847 Emerson Repr. Men, Napoleon Wks. (Bohn) I. 369 The times..and his early circumstances, combined to develop this pattern democrat. |
¶ 6. In the following, perh. = To bind: cf. combind. But other conjectures are current.
| 1603 Shakes. Meas. for M. iv. iii. 149 For my poore selfe, I am combined by a Sacred Vow, And shall be absent. [Cf. A.Y.L. v. iv. 156, and combinate a. b.] |
▪ II. combine, n.
(kəmˈbaɪn, now usu. ˈkɒmbaɪn)
[f. prec. vb.]
a. A combination, conspiracy, plot. Obs. exc. as in b.
| 1610 W. Folkingham Art Survey Author to Wk., A great Monarch hath those dire Combines, Hatcht in the Heart. 1889 G. B. Shaw London Music 1888–89 (1937) 195 When, after a few more years of competing syndicates, we have a great ‘combine’ of the Harris, Leslie, D'Oyly Carte, and all the other interests. 1899 T. M. Ellis 3 Cat's-Eye Rings i. 16 Why athleticism and æstheticism should not form a combine is a conundrum. 1936 Auden Look, Stranger! 43 Europe grew anxious about her health, Combines tottered, credits froze. 1936 Discovery Sept. 280/2 All types of industry from the combine employing its twenty thousand to the little workshop in the side street. 1955 Times 6 Aug. 7/7 Recently a multiple dairy, firm X, bought the business of a small dairyman with whom I had dealt for many years. Some days later I was surprised to find the milk of firm Y—another combine—delivered to me. |
b. Orig. U.S. colloq. (now standard). A combination of persons in furtherance of their own interests, commercial or political; a private combination for fraudulent ends. Also fig.
| 1887 Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 16 of the members..have formed what the New York Aldermen would call a ‘combine’, and demand $10,000 apiece before they will vote. 1888 Evening Post (N. York) 6 Mar. 4 An anti-Platt combine composed of seven senators. 1888 A. Roberts U.S. Consular Rep. Sept. 401 The market being controlled by the coal combine. |
c. combine harvester, an agricultural machine which performs various harvesting functions (as cutting, threshing, and bagging grain) simultaneously; also ellipt., and as combined harvester, and in other collocations with combine(d) as first element. So also combine drill (for sowing and fertilizing seeds in one operation), and similar formations.
| 1857 Illinois State Register (Springfield) 15 July 3/2 In the afternoon the combined mower and the Illinois mower were put upon trial, in a beautiful field of timothy. 1900 D. McK. Wright Wisps of Tussock 54 The engine beats and the combine sings to the drays that are leading in. 1923 J. R. Bond Farm Implements ix. 119 Combined fertiliser and seed drills are also made for ridge work. 1926 Kansas City Star 23 June, Hundreds of combines will be in the fields in southern, central, and western Kansas by Wednesday. 1927 Implement & Machinery Rev. LII. 1072/2 The combined harvester and thrasher made its first appearance at the Paris Show,..American firms have..been developing the combined harvester and thrasher for some years. 1929 Inst. Res. Agric. Engin. (Oxf. Univ.) Bull. No. 3. 7 Throughout this report the Combine Harvester or Harvester-Thresher is referred to as the ‘combine’. Ibid., The combine may be described as consisting of the knife and platform canvas of a binder attached to a travelling threshing machine. 1930 Engineering 18 July 83/1 But since suitable British combine machines have been placed on the market, a considerable number of orders have been secured by home firms. 1930 Manch. Guardian 16 Sept. 9/2 Great factories are now being equipped in Russia, so that tractors, combine-harvesters, milking machines, and all the equipment of a mechanised agricultural industry may be furnished in the future from native sources. 1932 Discovery Jan. 11/2 The combine-harvester—a machine in which a reaper is attached to a portable threshing machine and the whole is drawn by a tractor through the standing corn, leaving a trail of sacks of threshed grain and another of straw in its wake. 1941 Jrnl. Min. Agric. XLVIII. 186 A combine drill is now generally accepted as being superior to a seed drill and a broadcast fertilizer used separately. 1955 Times 10 May 17/5 The sombre picture of the weather last year threw into sharp relief the useful services performed by the combine harvester. 1957 Times 14 Oct. 2/6 Combine drills which place the fertilizer alongside the seed to give the seedlings a ready supply of plant food from the start of growth. 1958 Listener 16 Oct. 593/2 Some farmers were pushing or pulling self-propelled combines along with tractors. |