conceive

• conceave (obsolete)

From Middle English conceyven, from Old French concevoir, conceveir, from Latin concipiō, concipere (“to take”), from con- (“together”) + capiō (“to take”). Compare deceive, perceive, receive.

• IPA^(key): /kənˈsiːv/

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• Rhymes: -iːv

conceive (third-person singular simple present conceives, present participle conceiving, simple past and past participle conceived)

1. (transitive) To develop an idea; to form in the mind; to plan; to devise; to originate.
   • c. 1606–1607, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals), page 4:

     We shall, / As I conceive the journey, be at the Mount / Before you, Lepidus.

   • 1776, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: […] W[illiam] Strahan; and T[homas] Cadell, […], OCLC 995235880:

     It was among the ruins of the Capitol that I first conceived the idea of a work which has amused and exercised near twenty years of my life.

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter III, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., OCLC 222716698:

     Now all this was very fine, but not at all in keeping with the Celebrity's character as I had come to conceive it. The idea that adulation ever cloyed on him was ludicrous in itself. In fact I thought the whole story fishy, and came very near to saying so.

2. (transitive) To understand (someone).
   • 1731 (date written), Simon Wagstaff [pseudonym; Jonathan Swift], “An Introduction to the Following Treatise”, in A Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation, […], London: […] B[enjamin] Motte […], published 1738, OCLC 181801198, page lxii:

     […] you will hardly conceive him to have been bred in the ſame Climate […]

   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 3, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, OCLC 223202227:

     I conceive you.

3. (intransitive or transitive) To become pregnant (with).

   Assisted procreation can help those trying to conceive.

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, Luke 1:36:

     She hath also conceived a son in her old age.

4. To generate or engender; to bring into being.
   • 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, OCLC 1167497017:

     At the mouth of the cave we found a single litter with six bearers, all of them mutes, waiting, and with them I was relieved to see our old friend Billali, for whom I had conceived a sort of affection.

• conceive in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• conceive in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911

conceive

1. Alternative form of conceyven