siege

«siege» in Mova's school dictionary: when an army surrounds a town or castle and stops food… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

noun (a siege, sieges); verb (to siege — rare, usually «besiege»)

meaning for a pupil

1) A siege is when an army surrounds a town or castle and stops food and help getting in, so the people inside will give up. tree →

2) A siege can also be when police surround a building where someone is hiding, often with hostages. tree →

3) Under siege can mean being attacked or troubled from all sides by lots of problems or people. tree →

sense in the lessons

In history lessons it comes with castles, walls, catapults and starving towns; in news, «a police siege»; in everyday talk «under siege» is a strong way to say very busy or attacked; phrases: lay siege to, under siege, siege of (a town), lift the siege.

examples

• The castle held out through a long siege. tree →
• The army laid siege to the city for six months. tree →
• During the siege the people ate rats to survive. tree →
• Police ended the siege after ten hours. tree →
• The siege was lifted when help arrived. tree →
• On sale day the shop was under siege from shoppers. tree →
• We built a model siege engine in history. tree →
• When the enemies of Virgilius heard of this, they assembled together and laid siege to his castle. tree →

note

Spelling trap: «ie» — siege (not «seige»). The verb is usually «besiege». Countable: a siege, two sieges.

In the corpora

• Gather up thy wares from the ground, O thou that abidest in the siege.
• And thou shalt set thy face toward the siege of Jerusalem, with thine arm uncovered; and thou shalt prophesy against it.
• 'Thus saith Sennacherib king of Assyria: Whereon do ye trust, that ye abide the siege in Jerusalem?

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «siege» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.