collect

From Middle English collecten, a borrowing from Old French collecter, from Medieval Latin collectare (“to collect money”), from Latin collecta (“a collection of money, in Late Latin a meeting, assemblage, in Medieval Latin a tax, also an assembly for prayer, a prayer”), feminine of collectus, past participle of colligere, conligere (“to gather together, collect, consider, conclude, infer”), from com- (“together”) + legere (“to gather”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *leǵ- (“to gather, collect”).

• IPA^(key): /kəˈlɛkt/

• Audio (US)

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• Audio (Southern England)

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• Rhymes: -ɛkt

collect (third-person singular simple present collects, present participle collecting, simple past and past participle collected)

1. (transitive) To gather together; amass.
   • 2013 July-August, Henry Petroski, “Geothermal Energy”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4:

     Energy has seldom been found where we need it when we want it. Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame.

   Suzanne collected all the papers she had laid out.

   The team uses special equipment to collect data on temperature, wind speed and rainfall.

2. (transitive) To get; particularly, get from someone.

   A bank collects a monthly payment on a client's new car loan.   A mortgage company collects a monthly payment on a house.

3. (transitive) To accumulate (a number of similar or related objects), particularly for a hobby or recreation.

   John Henry collects stamps.

   I don't think he collects as much as hoards.

   My friend from school has started to collects mangas and novels recently

   • 2020 June 17, Stefanie Foster, “A window into the railways of the past”, in Rail, page 54:

     Over the course of 60 years, W E Hayward collected thousands of railway-related objects, including clothing, buttons, cutlery, timetables, tickets, name, number and builder's plates, books and booklets, cuttings and extracts from publications, letters, photographs and postcards.

4. (transitive) To pick up or fetch [someone, in a vehicle]

   Can you collect me from the airport?

5. (transitive, now rare) To form a conclusion; to deduce, infer. (Compare gather, get.)
   • 1690, John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book II, Chapter XVII, section 20:

     […] which consequence, I conceive, is very ill collected.

   • c 1725, John Walker, William Burton (of Bloomsbury), Essays and correspondence, chiefly on Scriptural subjects:

     From the latter passages we may collect, that the expression "he that cometh" was, with the Jews, a kind of title distinguishing the Messiah

   • 1814, Jane Austen, Mansfield Park:

     'I collect,' said Miss Crawford, 'that Sotherton is an old place, and a place of some grandeur. In any particular style of building?'

   • 1992, Hilary Mantel, A Place of Greater Safety, Harper Perennial, published 2007, pages 292–3:

     the riot is so great that it is very difficult to collect what is being said.

6. (intransitive, often with on or against) To collect payments.

   He had a lot of trouble collecting on that bet he made.

7. (intransitive) To come together in a group or mass.

   The rain collected in puddles.

8. (transitive) To infer; to conclude.
   • 1692–1717, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions, 6th edition, volumes (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: […] J[ames] Bettenham, for Jonah Bowyer, […], published 1727, →OCLC:

     Whence some collect that the former word imports a plurality of persons.

9. (transitive, of a vehicle or driver) To collide with or crash into (another vehicle or obstacle).

   The truck veered across the central reservation and collected a car that was travelling in the opposite direction.

• (to gather together): aggregate, gather up; see also Thesaurus:round up
• (to get from someone): receive, secure; see also Thesaurus:receive
• (to accumulate items for a hobby): amound, gather; see also Thesaurus:accumulate
• (to infer, conclude, form a conclusion): assume, construe
• (to collect payments):
• (to come together in a group or mass): group, mass, merge; see also Thesaurus:assemble or Thesaurus:coalesce
• (to collide with): bump into, plough into, run into

• garbage collect

collect (not comparable)

1. To be paid for by the recipient, as a telephone call or a shipment.

   It was to be a collect delivery, but no-one was available to pay.

collect (not comparable)

1. With payment due from the recipient.

   I had to call collect.

From Middle English collecte, from Ecclesiastical Latin collēcta (“assembly; collect”), originally designating the gathering at the beginning of a liturgical celebration.

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑlɪkt/, /ˈkɑlɛkt/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒlɪkt/, /ˈkɒlɛkt/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

collect (plural collects) (sometimes capitalized)

1. (Christianity) The prayer said before the reading of the epistle lesson, especially one found in a prayerbook, as with the Book of Common Prayer.

   He used the day's collect as the basis of his sermon.

• “collect”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “collect”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “collect”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.