adjective
Of or belonging to oneself or itself: She makes her own clothes.
noun
That which belongs to one: I wanted a room of my own.
verb
owned, own·ing, owns verb
transitivea. To have or possess as property: owns a chain of restaurants.
b. To have control over: For a time, enemy planes owned the skies.
- To admit as being in accordance with fact, truth, or a claim; acknowledge: “I own that I have been sly, thievish, mean, a prevaricator, greedy, derelict, / and I own that I remain so yet” ( Walt Whitman )
verb
intransitiveTo make a full confession or acknowledgment:
When confronted with the evidence the thief owned up to the crime. See Synonyms at
acknowledge.
Origin of own
Middle English
owene, owne from Old English
āgen ; see
aik- in Indo-European roots.
Related Forms:
Verb (third-person singular simple present owns, present participle owning, simple past and past participle owned)
- To have rightful possession of (property, goods or capital); "To possess by right; to have the right of property in; to have the legal right or rightful title to." (Ref 1)
- I own this car.
- To claim as one's own; to answer to.
- To defeat or embarrass; to overwhelm.
- I will own my enemies.
- If he wins, he will own you.
- To virtually or figuratively enslave.
- (gaming, slang) To defeat, dominate, or be above, also spelled pwn.
- (computing, slang) To illicitly obtain "super-user" or "root" access into a computer system thereby having access to all of the user files on that system; pwn.
- (intransitive) To admit to be true; concede, grant, allow, acknowledge, confess; not to deny; to admit to be true. (Ref 2)
- (intransitive) To acknowledge or admit the possession or ownership of. (Ref 3)
Origin From Middle English ownen, from Old English Ägnian (“to own"). Cognate with German eignen, Swedish ägna, Icelandic eiga. See also the related term owe.
Adjective - Belonging to; possessed; proper to.
- Surprisingly, I realised my own brother had the same idea as me. You need to find your own seat - this one is mine. He gave her a pen, because he already had his own. The restored Maxwell is Bob's own car. They went this way, but we need to find our own way. We have made some arrangements, but you will need to make your own. They were all prepared for the picnic, because they had all brought their own food and plates.
Usage notes - implying ownership, often with emphasis. It always follows a possessive pronoun, or a noun in the possessive case.
Origin From Middle English owen, aÈen, from Old English Ägen (“own, proper, peculiar"), from Proto-Germanic *aiganaz (“own"), from Proto-Indo-European *eiḱ- (“to have, possess"). Cognate with Scots ain (“own"), Dutch eigen (“own"), German eigen (“own"), Swedish egen (“own"), Icelandic eigin (“own").
Verb (third-person singular simple present owns, present participle owning, simple past and past participle owned)
- To admit; concede; acknowledge.
- To recognise; acknowledge.
- to own one as a son
- (intransitive, UK dialectal) To confess.
Origin From Middle English unnen (“to favour, grant"), from Old English unnan (“to grant, allow, recognise, confess"), from Proto-Germanic *unnanÄ… (“to grant, thank"), from Proto-Indo-European *Än- (“to notice"). Akin to German gönnen (from Old High German gi- + unnan), Old Norse unna (Danish unde) . In Gothic only the substantive ðŒ°ðŒ½ðƒð„ðƒ (ansts) is attested.
