bite

From Middle English biten, from Old English bītan (“bite”), from Proto-West Germanic *bītan, from Proto-Germanic *bītaną (“bite”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeyd- (“split”).

Cognates include Saterland Frisian biete (“bite”), West Frisian bite (“bite”), Dutch bijten (“bite”), German Low German bieten (“bite”), German beißen, beissen (“bite”), Danish bide (“bite”), Swedish bita (“bite”), Norwegian Bokmål bite (“bite”), Norwegian Nynorsk bita (“bite”), Icelandic bíta (“bite”), Gothic 𐌱𐌴𐌹𐍄𐌰𐌽 (beitan, “bite”), Latin findō (“split”), Ancient Greek φείδομαι (pheídomai), Sanskrit भिद् (bhid, “break”).

• enPR: bīt, IPA^(key): /baɪt/
• (Canada, regional US) IPA^(key): /bʌɪt/
• Rhymes: -aɪt

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Homophones: bight, by't, byte

bite (third-person singular simple present bites, present participle biting, simple past bit, past participle bitten or (rare) bit)

1. (transitive) To cut into something by clamping the teeth.

   As soon as you bite that sandwich, you'll know how good it is.

2. (transitive) To hold something by clamping one's teeth.
3. (intransitive) To attack with the teeth.

   That dog is about to bite!

4. (intransitive) To behave aggressively; to reject advances.

   If you see me, come and say hello. I don't bite.

5. (intransitive) To take hold; to establish firm contact with.

   I needed snow chains to make the tires bite.

6. (intransitive) To have significant effect, often negative.

   For homeowners with adjustable rate mortgages, rising interest will really bite.

7. (intransitive, of a fish) To bite a baited hook or other lure and thus be caught.

   Are the fish biting today?

8. (intransitive, figurative) To accept something offered, often secretly or deceptively, to cause some action by the acceptor.

   I've planted the story. Do you think they'll bite?

9. (intransitive, transitive, of an insect) To sting.

   These mosquitoes are really biting today!

10. (intransitive) To cause a smarting sensation; to have a property which causes such a sensation; to be pungent.

    It bites like pepper or mustard.

11. (transitive, sometimes figurative) To cause sharp pain or damage to; to hurt or injure.

    Pepper bites the mouth.

    • c. 1590–1592, William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act V, scene ii], page 229, column 1:

      […] froſts doe bite the Meads […]

12. (intransitive) To cause sharp pain; to produce anguish; to hurt or injure; to have the property of so doing.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, Proverbs 23:32, column 1:

      At the laſt it [wine] biteth like a ſerpent, and ſtingeth like ‖ an adder.

13. (intransitive) To take or keep a firm hold.

    The anchor bites.

14. (transitive) To take hold of; to hold fast; to adhere to.

    The anchor bites the ground.

    • 1859, Charles Dickens, “Fire Rises”, in A Tale of Two Cities, London: Chapman and Hall, […], OCLC 906152507, book II (The Golden Thread), page 152:

      […] the last screw of the rack having been turned so often that its purchase crumbled, and it now turned and turned with nothing to bite […]

15. (intransitive, slang) To lack quality; to be worthy of derision; to suck.

    This music really bites.

16. (transitive, informal, vulgar) To perform oral sex on. Used in invective.

    You don't like that I sat on your car? Bite me.

17. (intransitive, African-American Vernacular, slang) To plagiarize, to imitate.

    He always be biting my moves.

18. (obsolete) To deceive or defraud; to take in.

• bite down

• Sranan Tongo: beti

bite (plural bites)

1. The act of biting.
   • 1653, Iz[aak] Wa[lton], chapter VIII, in The Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man’s Recreation. Being a Discourse of Fish and Fishing, […], London: […] T. Maxey for Rich[ard] Marriot, […], OCLC 1097101645; reprinted as The Compleat Angler (Homo Ludens; 6), Nieuwkoop, South Holland, Netherlands: Miland Publishers, 1969, →ISBN:

     […] I have knowne a very good Fiſher angle diligently four or ſix hours in a day, for three or four dayes together for a River Carp, and not have a bite […]

2. The wound left behind after having been bitten.

   That snake bite really hurts!

3. The swelling of one's skin caused by an insect's mouthparts or sting.

   After just one night in the jungle I was covered with mosquito bites.

4. A piece of food of a size that would be produced by biting; a mouthful.

   There were only a few bites left on the plate.

5. (slang) Something unpleasant.

   That's really a bite!

6. (slang) An act of plagiarism.

   That song is a bite of my song!

7. A small meal or snack.

   I'll have a quick bite to quiet my stomach until dinner.

8. (figuratively) aggression
   • 2011 March 2, Saj Chowdhury, “Man City 3 - 0 Aston Villa”, in BBC‎:

     City scored the goals but periods of ball possession were shared - the difference being Villa lacked bite in the opposition final third.

9. The hold which the short end of a lever has upon the thing to be lifted, or the hold which one part of a machine has upon another.
10. (colloquial, dated) A cheat; a trick; a fraud.
    • 1725, Thomas Gordon, The Humorist

      The baser methods of getting money by fraud and bite, by deceiving and overreaching.

11. (colloquial, dated, slang) A sharper; one who cheats.
    • 1751, [Tobias] Smollett, “Pickle Seems Tolerably Well Reconciled to His Cage; […] ”, in The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume IV, London: Harrison and Co., […], published 1781, OCLC 316121541, page 385, column 1:

      [I]t was conjectured, that Peregrine was a bite from the beginning, who had found credit on account of his effrontery and appearance, and impoſed himſelf upon the town as a young gentleman of fortune.

12. (printing) A blank on the edge or corner of a page, owing to a portion of the frisket, or something else, intervening between the type and paper.
13. (slang) A cut, a proportion of profits; an amount of money.
    • 1951, William S. Burroughs, in Harris (ed.), Letters 1945–59, Penguin 2009, p. 92:

      I know three Americans who are running a bar. The cops come in all the time for a bite.

14. (television) Short for sound bite.
    • 2015, Robert A. Papper, Broadcast News and Writing Stylebook

      cold open: Starting a TV newscast with video or a bite from the lead story rather than starting with the anchor or the standard show open.

• (act of biting):
• (wound left behind after having been bitten):
• (swelling caused by an insect's mouthparts or sting): sting
• (piece of food of a size that would be produced by biting): mouthful
• (slang: something unpleasant):
• (slang: act of plagiarism):
• (small meal or snack): snack
• (figuratively: aggression):

• beetle
• bit

• Sranan Tongo: beti

• EBIT, Ebit, ebit, tebi-

• IPA^(key): [ˈbɪtɛ]
• Homophone: byte

bite

1. vocative singular of bit

• bitte

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• IPA^(key): /bit/

• Audio

  (file)

bite f (plural bites)

1. (slang, vulgar) knob, cock, dick
   • 2006, “Je veux te voir”, in Pop Up, performed by Yelle:

     Je veux te voir / Dans un film pornographique / En action avec ta bite / Forme potatoes ou bien frites

     (please add an English translation of this quote)

   • 2012, “Wesh Morray”, in Futur, performed by Booba:

     J'sors ma bite je la baise, tu sors ton biff tu la sors

     (please add an English translation of this quote)

   • 2015 [2004], Stéphane Dompierre, Un petit pas pour l'homme, →ISBN, page 57:

     J’ai la bite tellement raide que si son copain passe, il pourra me l’arracher et me péter les dents avec. Je vis dans un film érotique et je ne baise pas. Je n’y comprends rien.

     (please add an English translation of this quote)

   Il a souri quand j'ai mis la main entre ses cuisses et je me suis mise à frotter sa grosse bite.

   He smiled when I put my hand between his thighs and started to rub his big cock.

• “bite”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

bite

1. fruit

Unadapted borrowing from English bite.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbajt/
• Rhymes: -ajt

bite m (invariable)

1. (dentistry) split (dental device)

• IPA^(key): /bi˩.te˧/

bite

1. hot

• bi-üngte

• K. E. Herr (2011) The phonological interpretation of minor syllables, applied to Lemi Chin‎, Payap University, page 74

From Proto-Balto-Slavic *bitē (compare Lithuanian bitė), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰey-, *bʰī-. Cognate to English bee.

bite f (5th declension)

1. bee

From Proto-Huitoto-Ocaina *bíʔte.

• IPA^(key): [ˈbi.tɛ]
• Hyphenation: bi‧te

bite

1. (intransitive) To come.

• Shirley Burtch (1983) Diccionario Huitoto Murui (Tomo I) (Linguistica Peruana No. 20)‎ (in Spanish), Yarinacocha, Peru: Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, page 36
• Katarzyna Izabela Wojtylak (2017) A grammar of Murui (Bue): a Witotoan language of Northwest Amazonia.‎, Townsville: James Cook University press (PhD thesis), page 76

bite

1. plural of bita

bite

1. (Halligen), (Mooring) To bite.

From Old Norse bíta, from Proto-Germanic *bītaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeyd- (“to split”).

bite (present tense biter, past tense bet or beit, past participle bitt, present participle bitende)

1. To bite.

• bite i gresset
• bitende (adjective)

• bitt (noun)

• “bite” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

• bita (a infinitive)

From Old Norse bíta, from Proto-Germanic *bītaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeyd- (“to split”). Akin to English bite.

• IPA^(key): /²biːtɑ/

bite (present tense bit, past tense beit, supine bite, past participle biten, present participle bitande, imperative bit)

1. to bite

• “bite” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

From Proto-West Germanic *biti.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbi.te/

bite m

1. bite

• Middle English: bitte, bite (merged with descendant of Old English bita)
  • Scots: bit
  • English: bit

• IPA^(key): /ˈbi.tɛ/
• Rhymes: -itɛ
• Syllabification: bi‧te

bite

1. inflection of bity:
   1. neuter nominative/accusative/vocative singular
   2. nonvirile nominative/accusative/vocative plural

bite

1. dative singular of bit

From Old Frisian bīta.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbitə/

bite

1. To bite.

• “bite (I)”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011