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Definition of "descry" [de•scry]

  • To catch sight of (something difficult to discern). See Synonyms at see1. (verb-transitive)
  • To discover by careful observation or scrutiny; detect: descried a message of hope in her words. (verb-transitive)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "descry" in a sentence
  • "Shakespeare 'descry' also occurs in the sense of 'to reconnoitre.'"
  • "From my window I could descry, at no great distance, a very ordinary mortal of a man, working industriously among his cabbages."
  • "Barton a super-woman -- or at least they were personalities so designated by the cub book-reviewers, flat-floor men and women, and scholastically emasculated critics, who from across the dreary levels of their living can descry no glorious humans over-topping their horizons."