different between mince vs divide

English

Alternative forms

• minse (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English mincen, minsen; partly from Old English minsian, ?eminsian (“to make less, make smaller, diminish”), from Proto-Germanic *minnis?n? (“to make less”); partly from Old French mincer, mincier (“to cut into small pieces”), from mince (“slender, slight, puny”), from Frankish *minsto, *minnisto, superlative of *min, *minn (“small, less”), from Proto-Germanic *minniz (“less”); both from Proto-Indo-European *mey- (“small, little”). Cognate with Old Saxon mins?n (“to make less, make smaller”), Gothic ???????????????????????????? (minznan, “to become less, diminish”), Swedish minska (“to reduce, lessen”), Gothic ???????????????? (mins, “slender, slight”). More at min.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /m?ns/
• Rhymes: -?ns
• Homophone: mints

Noun

mince (countable and uncountable, plural minces)

1. (uncountable) Finely chopped meat.

   Mince tastes really good fried in a pan with some chopped onion and tomato.

2. (uncountable) Finely chopped mixed fruit used in Christmas pies; mincemeat.

   During Christmas time my dad loves to eat mince pies.

3. (countable) An affected (often dainty or short and precise) gait.
   • 2010, Tom Zoellner, Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World:

     His skin was china pale, he walked with a slight mince, and his silver mustache was always trimmed sharp; it was his custom to send a bouquet of pink carnations to the wives of men with whom he dined.

4. (countable) An affected manner, especially of speaking; an affectation.
   • 1928, R. M. Pope, in The Education Outlook, volume 80, page 285:

     And, further, who has not heard what someone has christened the "Oxford" mince, where every consonant is mispronounced and every vowel gets a wrong value?

   • 2008, Opie Read, The Colossus, page 95:

     [...] a smiling man, portly and impressive, coming toward them with a dignified mince in his walk.

5. (countable, Cockney rhyming slang, chiefly in the plural) An eye (from mince pie).

Quotations

• 1849, Herman Melville, Mardi, and a Voyage Thither:

  Not, — let me hurry to say, — that I put hand in tar bucket with a squeamish air, or ascended the rigging with a Chesterfieldian mince.

Translations

Verb

mince (third-person singular simple present minces, present participle mincing, simple past and past participle minced)

1. (transitive) To make less; make small.
2. (transitive) To lessen; diminish; to diminish in speaking; speak of lightly or slightingly; minimise.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:diminish

3. (transitive, rare) To effect mincingly.
4. (transitive, cooking) To cut into very small pieces; to chop fine.

5. (archaic, transitive, figuratively) To suppress or weaken the force of

   Synonyms: extenuate, palliate, weaken

   • 1681, John Dryden, The Spanish Friar, or the Double Discovery

     Siren, now mince the sin, / And mollify damnation with a phrase.

6. To say or utter vaguely, not directly or frankly

7. (transitive) To affect; to pronounce affectedly or with an accent.
   • 1869, Alexander J. Ellis, On Early English Pronunciation, with special reference to Shakespeare and Chaucer, part 1, page 194:

     In some districts of England ll is sounded like w, thus bowd (booud) for BOLD, bw (buu) for BULL, caw (kau) for CALL. But this pronunciation is merely a provincialism, and not to be imitated unless you wish to mince like these blunderers.

   • 1905, George Henderson, The Gaelic Dialects, IV, in the Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie, published by Kuno Meyer and L. Chr. Stern, volume 5, page 98:

     One may hear some speakers in Oxford mince brother into brover (brëvë); Bath into Baf; both into bof.
8. (intransitive) To walk with short steps; to walk in a prim, affected manner.

   • At the last moment Mollie, the foolish, pretty white mare who drew Mr. Jones's trap, came mincing daintily in, chewing at a lump of sugar.

   • 1769, King James Bible, Isaiah 3:16

     The daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, mincing as they go.
9. (intransitive) To act or talk with affected nicety; to affect delicacy in manner.

Usage notes

Current usage in the sense of “say or utter vaguely” is mostly limited to the phrase “mince words”; e.g., “I won't mince words with you”.

Derived terms

Translations

References

• mince in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Czech

Etymology

Borrowed from German Münze.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?m?nt?s?/
• Rhymes: -?nts?

Noun

mince f

1. coin

   Synonyms: peníz, moneta

   Hyponyms: m??ák, st?íbr?ák, zla?ák

Declension

Related terms

Further reading

• mince in P?íru?ní slovník jazyka ?eského, 1935–1957
• mince in Slovník spisovného jazyka ?eského, 1960–1971, 1989

French

Etymology

Derived from the verb mincer, from Old French mincier, from Vulgar Latin *min?ti?re (cf. also menuiser), from Latin min?tia.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /m??s/

Adjective

mince (plural minces)

1. thin, slim, slender

Derived terms

• amincir
• minceur
• mincir

Interjection

mince

1. drat!, darn!
2. wow!, blimey!

Further reading

• “mince” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Irish

Noun

mince f

1. genitive singular of minc (“mink”)

Mutation

Slovak

Noun

mince

1. inflection of minca:
   1. genitive singular
   2. nominative/accusative plural

English

Etymology

From Middle English dividen, from Latin d?v?dere (“to divide”). Displaced native Old English t?d?lan.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /d??va?d/

Verb

divide (third-person singular simple present divides, present participle dividing, simple past and past participle divided)

1. (transitive) To split or separate (something) into two or more parts.

   • Divide the living child in two.

2. (transitive) To share (something) by dividing it.
3. (transitive, arithmetic, with by) To calculate the number (the quotient) by which you must multiply one given number (the divisor) to produce a second given number (the dividend).

4. (transitive, arithmetic) To be a divisor of.

5. (intransitive) To separate into two or more parts.
6. (intransitive, biology) Of a cell, to reproduce by dividing.
7. To disunite in opinion or interest; to make discordant or hostile; to set at variance.

   • If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.

   • 1838, William H. Prescott, History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic

     Every family became now divided within itself.

8. (obsolete) To break friendship; to fall out.
9. (obsolete) To have a share; to partake.
10. To vote, as in the British parliament and other legislatures, by the members separating themselves into two parties (as on opposite sides of the hall or in opposite lobbies), that is, the ayes dividing from the noes.

    • The emperors sat, voted, and divided with their equals.

11. To mark divisions on; to graduate.

12. (music) To play or sing in a florid style, or with variations.

Synonyms

• (split into parts): cut up, disunite, partition, split, split up
• (share by dividing): divvy up, divide up, share, share out
• (separate into parts): separate, shear, split, split up

Antonyms

• (split into two or more parts): combine, merge, unify, unite
• (calculate times of multiplication): multiply

Derived terms

Terms derived from divide (verb and noun)

• continental divide
• Divide County
• divvy
• divide up, divvy up

Related terms

• (act of dividing): division
• (the sum being divided; the upper term in a fraction): dividend
• (the number of parts in a division; the lower term in a fraction): divisor

Translations

See also

• fraction, fraction slash, ?, fraction bar, vinculum (Australia)
• ratio, ? (also improperly :)
• (product of division): quotient
• (extra amount left by uneven division): remainder
• division sign, obelus, ÷
• division slash, ? (also improperly /)
• long division symbol, division bracket, )? or |?

Noun

divide (plural divides)

1. A thing that divides.

   Stay on your side of the divide, please.

2. An act of dividing.

   The divide left most of the good land on my share of the property.

   • 1975, Byte (issues 1-8, page 14)

     The extended instruction set may double the speed again if a lot of multiplies and divides are done.

3. A distancing between two people or things.

   There is a great divide between us.

4. (geography) A large chasm, gorge, or ravine between two areas of land.

   If you're heading to the coast, you'll have to cross the divide first.

   The team crossed streams and jumped across deep, narrow divides in the glacier.

   • 1922, A. M. Chisholm, A Thousand a Plate

     Carrying light packs they left camp at daylight the next morning. Trails there were none; but they followed the general course of a small creek, crossed a divide, and dipped down into a beautifully timbered valley watered by a swift, large creek of almost riverlike dimensions.

5. (hydrology) The topographical boundary dividing two adjacent catchment basins, such as a ridge or a crest.

Translations

Anagrams

• divied

Italian

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ide

Verb

divide

1. third-person singular present indicative of dividere

Latin

Verb

d?vide

1. second-person singular present active imperative of d?vid?

Portuguese

Verb

divide

1. Second-person singular (tu) affirmative imperative of dividir
2. Third-person singular (ele, ela, also used with tu and você^?) present indicative of dividir

Spanish

Verb

divide

1. Third-person singular (él, ella, also used with usted^?) present indicative form of dividir.
2. Informal second-person singular (tú) affirmative imperative form of dividir.