vanish

English

Etymology

Aphetic for obsolete evanish, from Middle English vanyshen, evaneschen, from Old French esvanir, esvaniss- (modern French évanouir), from Vulgar Latin *exvanire (“to vanish, disappear, to fade out”), from Latin evanescere, from vanus (“empty”). Doublet of evanesce.

Pronunciation

• enPR: văn'ĭsh, IPA^(key): /ˈvænɪʃ/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ænɪʃ
• Hyphenation: van‧ish

Verb

vanish (third-person singular simple present vanishes, present participle vanishing, simple past and past participle vanished)

1. To become invisible or to move out of view unnoticed.
   • 1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “Stave Three. The Second of the Three Spirits.”, in A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, pages 79–80:

     Holly, mistletoe, red berries, ivy, turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brawn, meat, pigs, sausages, oysters, pies, puddings, fruit, and punch, all vanished instantly.

   • 1920, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Avery Hopwood, chapter I, in The Bat: A Novel from the Play (Dell Book; 241), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 01:

     The Bat—they called him the Bat. Like a bat he chose the night hours for his work of rapine; like a bat he struck and vanished, pouncingly, noiselessly; like a bat he never showed himself to the face of the day.

   • 1982, Ashford & Simpson (lyrics and music), “Love It Away”, in Street Opera:

     I realize sometimes / In a web of passion we all get caught / But understand / All the hurt and all the pain / It's gonna vanish just like the rain

2. (mathematics) To become equal to zero.

   The function $f$ such as $f(x)=x^{2}$ vanishes at $x=0$.

3. (transitive) To disappear; to kidnap.
   • 2011, Patrick Meaney, Our Sentence Is Up: Seeing Grant Morrison's the Invisibles, Sequart, →ISBN, page 330:

     And as if to prove it, one of his friends was vanished and was never seen again. The guy got in a taxi one night, and no one ever saw him ever again.

   • 2004, John Varley, The John Varley Reader, Penguin, →ISBN:

     It was whispered that men had been “vanished” by the Line and returned everted. Turned inside out.

Synonyms

• disappear

Derived terms

• angle of vanishing stability
• Kodaira vanishing theorem
• vanishing foam
• vanishing fraction
• vanishing ideal
• vanishing point
• vanishing spray
• vanishing testes syndrome
• vanishing twin
• vanishing twin syndrome
• vanish into thin air

 

Related terms

• vain

Translations

become invisible or to move out of view unnoticed

• Afrikaans: verdwyn (af)
• Arabic: اِحْتَجَبَ (iḥtajaba), إخْتَفَى (ʔiḵtafā)
• Armenian: անհետանալ (hy) (anhetanal), կորչել (hy) (korčʻel), չքանալ (hy) (čʻkʻanal)
• Belarusian: зні́каць impf (zníkacʹ), зні́кнуць pf (zníknucʹ)
• Bulgarian: изчезвам (bg) (izčezvam)
• Catalan: esvanir-se (ca), desaparèixer (ca)
• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 消失 (siu¹ sat¹), 唔見／唔见 (m⁴ gin³) (colloquial)

  Mandarin: 消失 (zh) (xiāoshī)

• Czech: zmizet (cs)
• Danish: forsvinde (da)
• Dutch: verdwijnen (nl)
• Esperanto: neniiĝi
• Estonian: kaduma (et), haihtuma, hääbuma
• Finnish: hävitä (fi), kadota (fi)
• French: disparaître (fr), s’évanouir (fr)
• Galician: esvaer, esvaecer (gl)
• Georgian: გაქრობა (gakroba), გაუჩინარება (gaučinareba)
• German: verschwinden (de), vergehen (de), (sich) verflüchtigen (de)
• Greek: εξαφανίζομαι (el) (exafanízomai)

  Ancient: ἀφανίζομαι (aphanízomai)

• Indonesian: lenyap (id)
• Irish: imigh as amharc
• Italian: sparire (it), svanire (it)
• Japanese: 消える (ja) (きえる, kieru)
• Korean: 사라지다 (ko) (sarajida)
• Latin: ēvānescō, vānescō, aufugiō, abolescō, pereō
• Macedonian: и́счезне (ísčezne)
• Maori: whenumi, henumi, whakanumi, tarori, matangarongaro
• Mizo: bibo, bo
• Nepali: बिलाउनु (bilāunu)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: forsvinne (no), fordufte (no)

  Nynorsk: forsvinne, forsvinna

• Polish: znikać (pl) impf, zniknąć (pl) pf
• Portuguese: desaparecer (pt), esvair (pt), sumir (pt)
• Romanian: dispărea (ro)
• Russian: исчеза́ть (ru) (isčezátʹ)
• Serbo-Croatian: iščeznuti (sh)
• Slovak: zmiznúť
• Spanish: desvanecerse (es), desaparecer (es)
• Swedish: försvinna (sv)
• Turkish: yok olmak (tr)
• Ukrainian: зника́ти (znykáty)
• Walloon: disparexhe (wa)
• Welsh: diflannu (cy)

mathematics: to become equal to zero

• Bulgarian: клоня към нула (klonja kǎm nula)
• Czech: nulovat se
• Finnish: hävitä (fi)
• French: s’annuler (fr)
• German: verschwinden (de)
• Macedonian: ста́не ну́ла (stáne núla)
• Mizo: ral
• Portuguese: anular-se
• Romanian: anula (ro)
• Russian: обнули́ться (ru) (obnulítʹsja)
• Spanish: anularse (es)

Noun

vanish (plural vanishes)

1. (phonetics) The brief terminal part of a vowel or vocal element, differing more or less in quality from the main part.

   a as in ale ordinarily ends with a vanish of i as in ill.

   o as in old ordinarily ends with a vanish of oo as in foot.

   • 1827, James Rush, The Philosophy of the Human Voice:

     The median stres may also on a protracted quantity , slightly resemble respectively that of the radical and of the vanish , by sudenly enlarging in the course of the prolongation and gradualy diminishing ; and by the reverse

2. A magic trick in which something seems to disappear.

   The French drop is a well-known vanish involving sleight of hand.

See also

• glide

Anagrams

• shavin'