Word.ws English Dictionary

put forth

put forth verb: to give or supply; to make or create (implies trying or striving).

Verb

put forth (third-person singular simple present puts forth, present participle putting forth, simple past and past participle put forth)

  1. (transitive) To give or supply; to make or create (implies trying or striving).
    • to put forth an effort
    • Now, Marcus, now, thy Virtue’s on the Proof: / Put forth thy utmost Strength, work ev’ry Nerve, / And call up all thy Father in thy Soul:1712 (date written), [Joseph] Addison, Cato, a Tragedy. […], London: […] J[acob] Tonson, […], published 1713, →OCLC, Act I, scene i, page 3
  2. (transitive) To extend forward (a body part or something held).
    • Put forth thy hand, reach at the glorious gold.1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
    • […] he put forth the end of the rod that was in his hand, and dipped it in an honeycomb […]1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Samuel 14:27
  3. (transitive) To advance, offer, propose (often verbally).
    • They put forth queſtions of Aſtrologie, / VVhich Fauſtus anſwerd with ſuch learned ſkill, / As they admirde and wondred at his wit.1589–1592 (date written), Ch[ristopher] Marl[owe], The Tragicall History of D. Faustus. […], London: […] V[alentine] S[immes] for Thomas Bushell, published 1604, →OCLC, signature s D2, verso – D3...
    • Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field:1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew 13:24
  4. (obsolete, transitive) To send (someone) out, remove (someone) from a place.
    • […] they begot no children vntill they were put forth of Paradise […]1610, John Healey, transl., St. Augustine, Of the Citie of God, London: George Eld, Book 14, Chapter 21, p. 524
    • Then stood there up one in the council, a Pharisee, named Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, had in reputation among all the people, and commanded to put the apostles forth a little space;1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Acts 5:34
  5. (transitive) To emit, send out, give off (light, odour, etc.).
    • For inward light alas / Puts forth no visual beam.1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes, […].”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 17
    • […] now the Moon beginning to put forth her Silver Light, as the Poets call it (tho’ she looked at that Time more like a Piece of Copper) Jones called for his Reckoning […]1749, Henry Fielding, chapter 6, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book XII, page 367
  6. (intransitive, transitive) To grow, shoot, bud, or germinate.
    • […] her hedges even-pleach’d, / Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair, / Put forth disorder’d twigs;1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...
    • […] [t]ake from vnder Walls, or the like, where Nettles put forth in abundance, the Earth which you shall there finde […]1631, Francis [Bacon], “VI. Century.”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], 3rd edition, London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee...
  7. (intransitive, transitive) (of a ship) To leave (a port or haven).
    • […] order for sea is given; / They have put forth the haven [—] / Where their appointment we may best discover, / And look on their endeavour.c. 1606–1607 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard...
    • And where but from Nantucket, too, did that first adventurous little sloop put forth, partly laden with imported cobblestones—so goes the story—to throw at the whales, in order to discover when they were nigh enough to risk a harpoon from the bowsprit?1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 2, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC

put forth meaning in Tamil and Sanskrit

put forth in Tamil

எடுத்துமுன்வை, வெளியிடு

put forth in Sanskrit

to put forth, show, manifest, display, augment
तनोति tanóti

Examples of put forth in a sentence

  • Knightley dryly, “writes to a fair lady like Miss Woodhouse, he will, of course, put forth his best.”1815 December (indicated as 1816), [Jane Austen], chapter 16, in Emma: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [Charles...
  • He could not move as quickly as most men, but he put forth his utmost speed.1853, Elizabeth Gaskell, chapter 8, in Ruth:
  • So far as one can ascertain from the conflicting accounts that have been put forth, the majority of them remained busied with preparations […]1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter 1, in The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, published 1898, →OCLC, book I (The...
  • That survival was a triumph against the "stridently modernist" plans then put forth.2025 February 5, Dr Joseph Brennan, “Railway heritage saved in 2024”, in RAIL, number 1028, page 53, about Liverpool Street station in...

Forms of put forth

third-person singular presentputs forth
present participleputting forth
past participleput forth
pastput forth

Questions about put forth

What does put forth mean?
Put forth means to give or supply; to make or create (implies trying or striving).
What is put forth in Tamil?
Put forth in Tamil is எடுத்துமுன்வை, வெளியிடு. See Put forth meaning in Tamil.
How do you use put forth in a sentence?
Knightley dryly, “writes to a fair lady like Miss Woodhouse, he will, of course, put forth his best.”
What part of speech is put forth?
Put forth is a verb.
What is the past tense of put forth?
The past tense of put forth is put forth.

Words near put forth in the dictionary

  1. put down to
  2. put downs
  3. put facts on the ground
  4. put food on the table
  5. put foot to ass
  6. put forth
  7. put forward
  8. put hair on one's chest
  9. put hair on someone's chest
  10. put heads together
  11. put her there

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: put forth (page history and authors); put forth (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); तनोति (Sanskrit) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-put forth.wav.

Cite this entry: “put forth.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/put_forth. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.