carousing


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ca·rouse

 (kə-rouz′)
intr.v. ca·roused, ca·rous·ing, ca·rous·es
To drink large amounts of alcohol, especially in boisterous merrymaking.
n.
Carousal.
[Earlier, a cup drunk up completely in one draft as a toast, from French, carous as in French (boire) carous, (to drink a cup) up completely in one draft, from German gar aus(trinken), (to drink) up completely (used in such exhortations as trinks gar aus, drink it all up) : gar, completely (from Middle High German, from Old High German garo; akin to archaic English yare, ready) + aus, out, up; see auslander.]
ca·rous′er n.
Word History: From an etymological point of view, carousing is chugalugging. Carouse ultimately comes from German gar aus, words forming part of the exhortation trinks gar aus, "drink it all up!" with which German revelers urged their drinking companions to drain their cups. The phrase trinks gar aus is repeated, for example, at the end of one of the most popular German drinking songs of the 1500s, So trinken wir alle ("So drink we all"). Gar aus, "completely up," had already spread to French by the middle of the 1500s as carous, also spelled carrousse. This word was used in such phrases as boire carous, "to drink by draining a cup dry in one draft, chug." (The change of the initial German g to c in French carous may reflect a Swiss dialectal pronunciation of g, which may have sounded like c or k to French ears.) French carrousse soon made its way into English as carouse. In the 1500s, English carouse was often used as an adverb in such phrases as to quaff carouse, "to drink dry in one draft," but it could also function as a noun meaning "a cup drunk dry in toasting someone's health." Such drinks were typically tossed back in company, and when done so repeatedly, this soon led to what we now call carousing.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:
Adj.1.carousing - used of riotously drunken merrymakingcarousing - used of riotously drunken merrymaking; "a night of bacchanalian revelry"; "carousing bands of drunken soldiers"; "orgiastic festivity"
bacchanal, bacchanalian, bacchic, orgiastic
drunk, inebriated, intoxicated - stupefied or excited by a chemical substance (especially alcohol); "a noisy crowd of intoxicated sailors"; "helplessly inebriated"
Based on WordNet 3.0, Farlex clipart collection. © 2003-2012 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.
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For always, drunk or sober, at the back of my consciousness something whispered that this carousing and bay-adventuring was not all of life.
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One was the great fire on shore, by which the defeated pirates lay carousing in the swamp.
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The next Legree heard of his mother was, when, one night, as he was carousing among drunken companions, a letter was put into his hand.
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The more business he got, the greater his power seemed to grow of getting at its pith and marrow; and however late at night he sat carousing with Sydney Carton, he always had his points at his fingers' ends in the morning.
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Archer turned from the fascinated contemplation of a small painting representing two Cardinals carousing, in an octagonal ebony frame set with medallions of onyx.
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He never went about otherwise than surrounded by a small court of bishops and abbés of high lineage, gallant, jovial, and given to carousing on occasion; and more than once the good and devout women of Saint Germain d' Auxerre, when passing at night beneath the brightly illuminated windows of Bourbon, had been scandalized to hear the same voices which had intoned vespers for them during the day carolling, to the clinking of glasses, the bacchic proverb of Benedict XII., that pope who had added a third crown to the Tiara-- Bibamus papaliter .
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That done, he disposed himself in an easy attitude on the ground beside his two companions (who were carousing after their own tastes), and proceeded to enlighten Mr Dennis in reference to to-morrow's project.
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They had been attracted more by the prospect of disorder than, by the big wages; and they made the night hideous with singing and carousing, and only went to sleep when the time came for them to get up to work.
And then at night, when this throng poured out into the streets to play--fighting, gambling, drinking and carousing, cursing and screaming, laughing and singing, playing banjoes and dancing!
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By and by she tucked them up in the great bed in the home under the trees, but she herself slept that night in the little house, and Peter kept watch outside with drawn sword, for the pirates could be heard carousing far away and the wolves were on the prowl.
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She said child negligence was also rife in the era with some parents resorting to taking their children to nursery schools and boarding schools in pursuit of carousing.
Children need effective parenting
PARTY QUEENA female officer who was a friend of Ms Ngoi told the Nation that the 24-year-old was a "party queen" who loved carousing and had many male friends.The warder was described by her colleagues as a beauty queen who loved going out whenever she was not on duty.
'Beauty queen' prison warder found murdered in Murang'a

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