different between invert vs annul

English

Pronunciation

• (verb):
  • (UK) IPA^(key): /?n?v??t/
  • (US) enPR: ?n-v?rt?, IPA^(key): /?n?v?t/
  • Rhymes: -??(r)t
• (noun):
  • (UK) IPA^(key): /??nv??t/
  • (US) enPR: ?n?v?rt, IPA^(key): /??nv?t/

Etymology 1

From Middle French invertir

Verb

invert (third-person singular simple present inverts, present participle inverting, simple past and past participle inverted)

1. (transitive) To turn (something) upside down or inside out; to place in a contrary order or direction.

   to invert a cup, the order of words, rules of justice, etc.

   • 1782, William Cowper, Table Talk

     Such reasoning falls like an inverted cone, / Wanting its proper base to stand upon.

2. (transitive, music) To move (the root note of a chord) up or down an octave, resulting in a change in pitch.
3. (chemistry, intransitive) To undergo inversion, as sugar.
4. To divert; to convert to a wrong use.
5. (anatomy) To turn (the foot) inwards.

Derived terms

• invert sugar
• inverted
• invertible

Related terms

• inversion

Translations

See also

• convert

Noun

invert (plural inverts)

1. (obsolete, psychology) A homosexual.
   • 1897, W. Havelock Ellis, Sexual Inversion, p. 202:

     We can seldom, therefore, congratulate ourselves on the success of any "cure" of inversion. The success is unlikely to be either permanent or complete, in the case of a decided invert; and in the most successful cases we have simply put into the invert's hands a power of reproduction which it is undesirable he should possess.

2. (architecture) An inverted arch (as in a sewer). *
3. The base of a tunnel on which the road or railway may be laid and used when construction is through unstable ground. It may be flat or form a continuous curve with the tunnel arch.
4. (civil engineering) The lowest point inside a pipe at a certain point.
5. (civil engineering) An elevation of a pipe at a certain point along the pipe.
6. A skateboarding trick where the skater grabs the board and plants a hand on the coping so as to balance upside-down on the lip of a ramp.

Translations

Adjective

invert (not comparable)

1. (chemistry) Subjected to the process of inversion; inverted; converted.

   invert sugar

Etymology 2

Noun

invert (plural inverts)

1. (zoology, informal) An invertebrate.

References

Anagrams

• Vinter, ventri-, virent

English

Etymology

From Middle English annullen, from Old French anuller, from Latin annull? (“annihilate, annul”), from ad (“to”) + n?llus (“none, not any”).

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -?l
• IPA^(key): /??n?l/
• Homophone: Anal (an ethnic group in India; not to be confused with anal, which is not homophonous)

Verb

annul (third-person singular simple present annuls, present participle annulling, simple past and past participle annulled)

1. (transitive) To formally revoke the validity of.
   • 1902, William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Lecture 2:

     If you ask how religion thus falls on the thorns and faces death, and in the very act annuls annihilation, I cannot explain the matter, for it is religion's secret, and to understand it you must yourself have been a religious man of the extremer type.

2. (transitive) To dissolve (a marital union) on the grounds that it is not valid.

Derived terms

• annulment

Related terms

• (formally revoke the validity of): make or render null and void, null, nullify
• (dissolve (a marital union)): dissolve

Translations

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “annul”, in Online Etymology Dictionary

Anagrams

• Luann, Lunan