eat

Etymology 1

From Middle English eten, from Old English etan (“to eat”), from Proto-West Germanic *etan, from Proto-Germanic *etaną (“to eat”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁édti, from *h₁ed- (“to eat”).

verb

1. To ingest; to be ingested.
   1. (transitive, intransitive) To consume (something solid or semi-solid, usually food) by putting it into the mouth and swallowing it.
      He's eating an apple. / Don't disturb me now; can't you see that I'm eating?
      But Richmond[…]appeared to lose himself in his own reflections. Some pickled crab, which he had not touched, had been removed with a damson pie; and his sister saw[…]that he had eaten no more than a spoonful of that either. 1959, Georgette Heyer, chapter 1, in The Unknown Ajax
      Shepard: Everyone on this station is chafing under Anoleis' extortion. You might end up a hero. Lorik Qui'in: My employers rely on the goodwill of the Executive Board to work here. Wrex: If these "executives" don't blame Anoleis for provoking this, they're fools. You should eat them. 2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Noveria
   2. (intransitive) To consume a meal.
      What time do we eat this evening?
      I eat in the kitchen. Audio (US) (file) 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)
   3. (intransitive, ergative) To be eaten.
      It's a soup that eats like a meal.
      I don't know any quarter in England where you get such undeniable mutton—mutton that eats like mutton, instead of the nasty watery, stringy, turnipy stuff, neither mutton nor lamb, that other countries are inundated with. 1852, The New Monthly Magazine, page 310
   4. (copulative, intransitive) To have a particular quality of diet; to be well-fed or underfed (typically as "eat healthy" or "eat good").
2. To use up.
   1. (transitive, often with up) To destroy, consume, or use up.
      This project is eating up all the money.
   2. (transitive, programming, informal) To consume (an exception, an event, etc.) so that other parts of the program do not receive it.
      A bigger problem, however, is that if you catch/eat an exception and do nothing with it, you are very likely introducing subtle bugs in your application that will be next to impossible to track down. 2005, Wallace B. McClure, Gregory A. Beamer, John J. Croft IV, Professional ADO.NET 2, page 246
   3. (transitive, informal, of a device) To damage, destroy, or fail to eject a removable part or an inserted object.
      The VHS recorder just ate the tape and won't spit it out.
      John is late for the meeting because the photocopier ate his report.
      No! There's a problem with the cassette player. Don't press fast forward or it eats the tape! 1991, Shane Black, The Last Boy Scout (movie)
   4. (transitive, informal, of a vending machine or similar device) To consume money (or other instruments of value, such as a token) deposited or inserted by a user, while failing to either provide the intended product or service or return the payment.
      The video game in the corner just ate my quarter.
      Hey! This stupid [soda vending] machine ate my quarter. 1977, Nancy Dowd, Slap Shot (movie)
3. (transitive, informal) To cause (someone) to worry.
   What's eating you?
4. (transitive, business) To take the loss in a transaction.
   I have to have him in court tomorrow, if he doesn't show up, I forfeit the bond and I have to eat the $300,000. 1988, George Gallo, Midnight Run (movie)
   The server made an error when taking the order. The bartender prepared two scorpion bowls. When the error was realized the bartender was faced with having to "eat" the extra scorpion bowl […] 1999, Ronald S. Beitman, Liquor Liability: A Primer for Winning Your Case, page 27
   When they were doing it with the valuation professionals, they were billing the client, but the valuation professional in a lot of those early cases had to eat the cost of showing the auditor how the auditors' test model was incorrect. 2011, Lorenzo Carver, Venture Capital Valuation
5. (transitive, slang) To be injured or killed by (something such as a firearm or its projectile), especially in the mouth.
   I risk my whole future, the hatred of the cops and Eddie Mars' gang. I dodge bullets and eat saps. 1944, William Faulkner, Leigh Brackett, Jules Furthman, The Big Sleep (screenplay)
   And, of course, there was Brian Rusk, who had eaten a bullet at the ripe old age of eleven. 1991, Stephen King, Needful Things
   Friends are only necessary in the ghastly country, where you have to have them, along with rubber boots and a barometer and secateurs, to put off bucolic idiocy, a wet brain, or eating the 12-bore. 1997, A. A. Gill, "Diary" (in The Spectator, 1 November 1997)
   Mike had been to other calls where someone had eaten a gun. He knew to expect teeth embedded in the ceiling and brains dripping off it. 2012, Kaya McLaren, How I Came to Sparkle Again: A Novel, St. Martin's Press
   The animal was sweating and scared and MacAdams was surprised when they finished up without either of them eating a kick. 2017, Edward W. Robertson, Stardust, Edward W. Robertson
   There was a resounding smacking noise and Georgy was sure Philip had just eaten a fist. 2018, Daniel Tomazic, Of Bullies and Men: Young Adult Fiction, page 18
6. (transitive, intransitive) To corrode or erode.
   The acid rain ate away the statue.  The strong acid eats through the metal.
7. (transitive, slang) To perform oral sex (on a person or body part).
   Eat me!
   I ate his ass.
   Yeah, eat that dick / eat that pussy.
8. (stative, slang) To be very good; to rule; to rock.
   You ate that performance!
   This song eats!

Etymology 2

From Middle English ete, ate, æte, from Old English ǣt (“food, eating”), from Proto-West Germanic *āt, from Proto-Germanic *ētą (“food, thing to eat”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁ed- (“to eat”). Cognate with North Frisian ad, it (“food”), German Aas (“carrion”), Norwegian åt, Icelandic át (“food”).

noun

1. (colloquial) Something to be eaten; a meal; a food item.
   Eating a Picnic creates a flurry of wafer pieces, flying peanuts and chocolate crumbs. […] As well as being messy, Picnic happens to be a big eat – something of a consumption challenge in fact. 2011, William Chitty, Nigel Barker, Michael Valos, Integrated Marketing Communications, page 167