IMITATE • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Imitate

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/ˈɪmətˌeɪt/ Listen

verb

Imitate v. t. (past & past part. imitated; pres. part. imitating)

To follow as a pattern, model, or example; to copy or strive to copy, in acts, manners etc. "Despise wealth and imitate a dog."

To produce a semblance or likeness of, in form, character, color, qualities, conduct, manners, and the like; to counterfeit; to copy. "A place picked out by choice of best alive The Nature's work by art can imitate." "This hand appeared a shining sword to weild, And that sustained an imitated shield."

(Biol.) To resemble (another species of animal, or a plant, or inanimate object) in form, color, ornamentation, or instinctive habits, so as to derive an advantage thereby; sa, when a harmless snake imitates a venomous one in color and manner, or when an odorless insect imitates, in color, one having secretion offensive to birds.

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Etymology of 'Imitate'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Imitate" Quotes from Famous Books

... extensive and beautiful; you look down on a vale which winds almost around at your feet, finishing to the left in Cork river, which here takes the appearance of a lake, bounded by wood and hills, and sunk in the bottom of a vale, in a style which painting cannot imitate; the opposite hills of Lota, wood, and lawn, seem formed as objects for this point of view: at your feet a hill rises out of the vale, with higher ones around it, the margins scattered wood; to the right, towards Riverstown, a vale; the whole backed by cultivated hills to Kallahan's ...

— A Tour in Ireland - 1776-1779 • Arthur Young

... put it to me, "screebled" a cafe scene; on the left you see a native, who calls himself Jock Furgusson, trying to pass off a "Genuine Egyptian Scarab" to a tourist. Jock Furgusson is infinitely more wonderful and artistic to me than the pyramids, for he can imitate accents so as to make you gasp; he spots anyone's nationality instantaneously—before you have opened your lips he knows your county! I believe he can distinguish between the English of a Lowland ...

— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch

... but that of others. I wished every English poet blotted out of the memory of mankind. I blasphemed the mightiest names of song because they had drawn Charlie from the path of direct narrative, and would, later, spur him to imitate them; but I choked down my impatience until the first flood of enthusiasm should have spent itself and the boy returned ...

— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling

... great honor as well as happiness. I fear I was not worthy of it, but I tried to be, and felt a tender satisfaction in thinking that I owed it to dear Lucretia, in part at least; for my effort to imitate her made me fitter to become a wise man's wife, and thirty years of very sweet ...

— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott

... down at the fishes below, that she expressed a wish to imitate them; and he agreeing, she ran up to the farm for a bit of rope and was back before he had half comprehended all the beauties of the pool. And he had no sooner explained the necessary movements to her and she had tried them, than she cast off the rope, shouting, "I can swim! I can swim!" and to ...

— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham

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