Etymology : Middle English cerchen, from Middle French cerchier to go about, survey, search, from Late Latin circare to go about, from Latin circum round about; more at CIRCUM-
Pronunciation : s&rch
Function : verb
Date : 14th century
1. quest, hunt, instance of looking for something; investigation, examination. seek, hunt for, look for; investigate, examine; penetrate; conduct an examination or investigation. search\search\, v. i. to seek; to look for something; to make inquiry, exploration, or examination; to hunt. once more search with me. it sufficeth that they have once with care sifted the matter, and searched into all the particulars.search \search\, n. [cf. of. cerche. see:
search, v. t.] the act of seeking or looking for something; quest; inquiry; pursuit for finding something; examination. thus the orb he roamed with narrow search, and with inspection deep considered every creature. nor did my search of liberty begin till my black hairs were changed upon my chin.
2. To look over or through, for the purpose of finding something; to examine; to explore; as, to search the city.
3. To inquire after; to look for; to seek.
4. To examine or explore by feeling with an instrument; to probe; as, to search a wound.
5. To examine; to try; to put to the test.
6. To seek; to look for something; to make inquiry, exploration, or examination; to hunt.
7. The act of seeking or looking for something; quest; inquiry; pursuit for finding something; examination. an investigation seeking answers; "a thorough search of the ledgers revealed nothing"; "the outcome justified the search" boarding and inspecting a ship on the high seas; "right of search" the activity of looking thoroughly in order to find something or someone the examination of alternative hypotheses; "his search for a move that would avoid checkmate was unsuccessful" an operation that determines whether one or more of a set of items has a specified property; "they wrote a program to do a table lookup" try to locate or discover, or try to establish the existence of; "The police are searching for clues"; "They are searching for the missing man in the entire county" subject to a search; "The police searched the suspect"; "We searched the whole house for the missing keys" search or seek; "We looked all day and finally found the child in the forest"; "Look elsewhere for the perfect gift!".
8. 1. If you search for something or someone, you look carefully for them. The Turkish security forces have started searching for the missing men Nonetheless there are signs that both sides may be searching for a compromise.
9. If you search a place, you look carefully for something or someone there. Armed troops searched the hospital yesterday She searched her desk for the necessary information Relief workers are still searching through collapsed buildings looking for victims.
10. A search is an attempt to find something or someone by looking for them carefully. There was no chance of him being found alive and the search was abandoned Egypt has said there is no time to lose in the search for a Middle East settlement.
11. If a police officer or someone else in authority searches you, they look carefully to see:
whether you have something hidden on you. The man took her suitcase from her and then searched her His first task was to search them for weapons.
12. If you search for information on a computer, you give the computer an instruction to find that information. You can use a directory service to search for people on the Internet. Search is also a noun. He was doing a computer search of local news articles. see also:
searching, strip-search.
13. If you go in search of something or someone, you try to find them. Miserable, and unexpectedly lonely, she went in search of Jean-Paul The law already denies entry to people in search of better economic opportunities.
14. emphasis You say `search me' when someone asks you a question and you want to emphasize that you do not know the answer. search for extraterrestrial intelligence search and seizure search engine.