take down

take down (third-person singular simple present takes down, present participle taking down, simple past took down, past participle taken down)

1. To remove something from a wall or similar vertical surface to which it is fixed.

   He took down the picture and replaced it with the framed photograph.

2. To remove something from a hanging position.

   We need to take down the curtains to be cleaned.

3. To remove something from a website.

   We must take this fake news item down today.

4. To write down as a note, especially to record something spoken.
   • 1966, Phil Ochs, “Love Me, I'm a Liberal”, in Phils Ochs in Concert:

     But if you ask me to bus my children / I hope the cops take down your name

   If you have a pen, you can take down my phone number.

5. To remove a temporary structure such as scaffolding.

   When everything else is packed, we can take down the tent.

6. To lower an item of clothing without removing it.

   The doctor asked me to take down my trousers.

7. To arrest someone or to place them in detention.

   You have been found guilty. Take the prisoner down.

   We've got enough evidence now to take McFee down.

8. To swallow.
   • 2012, The Onion Book of Known Knowledge, page 121:

     Marcus Seltz, who can take down a bucket of crab legs like a freaking combine.

   I took down the medicine and soon felt better.

9. To defeat; to destroy or kill (a person).
   • 2012, Kira Sinclair, Take It Down, →ISBN, page 191:

     It took me eight years to get enough on the asshole to try and take him down.

   • 2014, Mallery Malone, Take Down, →ISBN:

     They'd had occasion to see Peyton Armistead in all his righteous fury and she knew they wouldn't hesitate to take him down if she gave the word.

   • 2014, David Mitchell, The Bone Clocks, →ISBN, page 431:

     So Marinus, me and a few other unthanked individuals - Atemporals for the most part, with some mortal collaborators — make it our business to ...take them down.

10. (combat sports) To force one’s opponent off their feet in order to transition from striking to grappling in jujitsu, mixed martial arts, etc.
11. (intransitive, colloquial) To collapse or become incapacitated from illness or fatigue.
    • 1880, Albert Adams Graham, History of Richland County, Ohio, page 254:

      " […] I mind the year after we came, my father took down with the ague, and things looked dark enough for a while; but, when old Billy Slater, on the Clear Fork killed a fat cow, he loaded a lot of the choicest on to a horse and brought it to us; […]"

    • 1948, “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)”, Woody Guthrie (lyrics):

      My brothers and sisters come working the fruit trees, / And they rode the truck till they took down and died.

12. (transitive) To reduce.

    to take the volume down a bit

• downtake