Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To deny, as a request, demand, or invitation; decline to do or grant: as, to refuse admittance; she refused herself to callers.
  • To decline to accept; reject: as, to refuse an office; to refuse an offer.
  • To disown; disavow; forsake.
  • Milit., to hold (troops) back, or move (them) back from the regular alinement, when about to engage the enemy in battle. In the oblique order of battle, if either flank attack, the other flank is refused.
  • Fail to receive; resist; repel.
  • Synonyms and Decline, Refuse, Reject, Repel, and Rebuff are in the order of strength.
  • To decline to accept or consent; fail to comply.
  • To fuse or melt again.
  • In chess, same as decline, 10.
  • noun That which is refused or rejected; waste or useless matter; the worst or meanest part; rubbish.
  • noun Synonyms Dregs, scum, dross, trash, rubbish.
  • Refused; rejected; hence, worthless; of no value: as, the refuse parts of stone or timber.
  • noun A refusal.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To deny, as a request, demand, invitation, or command; to decline to do or grant.
  • transitive verb (Mil.) To throw back, or cause to keep back (as the center, a wing, or a flank), out of the regular aligment when troops ar� about to engage the enemy.
  • transitive verb To decline to accept; to reject; to deny the request or petition of.
  • transitive verb obsolete To disown.
  • noun obsolete Refusal.
  • adjective Refused; rejected; hence; left as unworthy of acceptance; of no value; worthless.
  • intransitive verb To deny compliance; not to comply.
  • noun That which is refused or rejected as useless; waste or worthless matter.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To decline (a request or demand).
  • verb intransitive To decline a request or demand, forbear; to withhold permission.
  • adjective Discarded, rejected.
  • noun Collectively, items or material that have been discarded; rubbish, garbage.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb resist immunologically the introduction of some foreign tissue or organ
  • verb refuse to accept
  • verb refuse entrance or membership
  • verb refuse to let have
  • verb elude, especially in a baffling way
  • verb show unwillingness towards
  • noun food that is discarded (as from a kitchen)

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old French refuser, from Vulgar Latin *refusare, a blend of Classical Latin refutō and recusō.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Apparently from Old French refuse (French refusé), past participle of refuser ("to refuse"), as Etymology 2, below.

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Examples

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  • Trash vs. turn down.

    November 24, 2007