lease

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /liːs/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːs

From Middle English lesen, from Old English lesan (“to collect, pick, select, gather”), from Proto-Germanic *lesaną (“to gather”), from Proto-Indo-European *les- (“to gather”). Cognate with Scots lease (“to arrange, gather”), Saterland Frisian leese (“to gather, read”), West Frisian lêze (“to read”), Dutch lezen (“to gather, read”), German lesen (“to gather, read”), Danish læse (“to collect, read”).

lease (third-person singular simple present leases, present participle leasing, simple past and past participle leased)

1. (transitive, chiefly dialectal) to gather.
2. (transitive, chiefly dialectal) to pick, select, pick out; to pick up.
3. (transitive, chiefly dialectal) to glean.
4. (intransitive, chiefly dialectal) to glean, gather up leavings.

For quotations of use of this term, see Citations:lease.

From Middle English lesen, from Old English lēasian (“to lie, tell lies”), from lēas (“falsehood, lying, untruth, mistake”).

lease (third-person singular simple present leases, present participle leasing, simple past and past participle leased)

1. (transitive, intransitive, Britain dialectal) To tell lies; tell lies about; slander; calumniate.

• leasing

From Middle English lese, from Old English lǣs (“meadow”), from Proto-Germanic *lēswō (“meadow”), from Proto-Indo-European *lēy-, *lēyd- (“to leave, let”). Cognate with Old Saxon lēsa (“meadow”). See also leasow.

• leaze

lease (plural leases)

1. an open pasture or common
   • 1928, Thomas Hardy, He Never Expected Much:

     Since as a child I used to lie

     Upon the leaze and watch the sky,

     Never, I own, expected I

     That life would all be fair.

From Middle English lesen, from Old English līesan (“to loosen, release, redeem, deliver, liberate”), from Proto-Germanic *lausijaną (“to release, loosen”), from Proto-Indo-European *lew- (“to cut, solve, separate”). Cognate with Dutch lozen (“to drain, discharge”), German lösen (“to release”), Swedish lösa (“to solve”), Icelandic leysa (“to solve”).

• leese (Scotland)

lease (third-person singular simple present leases, present participle leasing, simple past and past participle leased)

1. (transitive, Britain dialectal) To release; let go; unloose.

From Middle English *lesen, from Anglo-Norman *leser, Old French lesser, laisier (“to let, let go”), partly from Latin laxō (“to loose”) and partly from Old High German lāzan (“to let, let go, release”) (German lassen). Cognate with Old English lǣtan (“to allow, let go, leave, rent”). More at let.

lease (third-person singular simple present leases, present participle leasing, simple past and past participle leased)

1. (transitive) To operate or live in some property or land through purchasing a long-term contract (or leasehold) from the owner (or freeholder).
2. (transitive) To take or hold by lease.
3. (intransitive) To grant a lease; to let or rent.

• re-lease

lease (plural leases)

1. A contract granting use or occupation of property during a specified period in exchange for a specified rent
2. The period of such a contract
   • 1609, William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18:

     Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

     And summer's lease hath all too short a date:

3. A leasehold

• → Dutch: leasen
• ⇒ English: leasing
  • → Polish: leasing
  • → Spanish: leasing
  • → Swedish: leasing

• lessor, lessee

From leash.

lease (plural leases)

1. The place at which the warp-threads cross on a loom.

• Elsea, Seale, eales, easel, seale

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  (file)

lease

1. first-person singular present indicative of leasen
2. (archaic) singular present subjunctive of leasen
3. imperative of leasen

lease

1. Alternative form of les

lease

1. Alternative form of les