elongate

Etymology

New Latin elongare, a combination of ex- (“out”) + longus (“long”). Doublet of eloign.

verb

1. (transitive) To make long or longer by pulling and stretching; to make elongated.
   When the muscles of the heart cease to act, the refluent blood again distends or elongates them; and thus irritated they contract as before. 1794, Erasmus Darwin, chapter 7, in Zoonomia, volume 1, London: J. Johnson, section 14, page 123
   As Mr. Arabin had already moved out of the parsonage of St. Ewold’s, that scheme of elongating the dining-room was of course abandoned; 1857, Anthony Trollope, chapter 26, in Barchester Towers, volume 2, Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1859, page 335
   … elongating his gaze to the remotest point of the ashpit, [he] said … 1874, Thomas Hardy, chapter 8, in Far from the Madding Crowd, volume 1, London: Smith, Elder, page 105
2. (intransitive) To become long or longer by being pulled or stretched; to become elongated.
   A writer may tell me that he thinks man will ultimately become an ostrich. I cannot properly contradict him. But before he can expect to bring any reasonable person over to his opinion, he ought to shew, that the necks of mankind have been gradually elongating … 1798, Thomas Malthus, chapter 1, in An Essay on the Principle of Population, London: J. Johnson, page 10
   Here, Mr. Lorry perceived the reflexion on the wall to elongate … 1859, Charles Dickens, chapter 8, in A Tale of Two Cities, volume book 3, London: Chapman and Hall, page 204
   His face elongated daily, and his melancholy eyes burned in deepening sockets like dim candles … 1951, Herman Wouk, chapter 3, in The Caine Mutiny, volume part1, New York: Doubleday, page 27
3. (transitive, obsolete) To move to or place at a distance (from something).
   … let the common house of easement [[Unsupported titles/`lsqb`i.e.#English|[i.e.]] the outhouse] be ouer some water, or els elongated from the house. 1547, Andrew Boorde, chapter 3, in A Compendyous Regyment or a Dyetary of Healthe, London: William Powell
   … let us shew in how many particulars they [wicked men] are thus elongated, or made afar off from God. 1652, Anthony Burgess, Spiritual Refining, London: Thomas Underhill, Sermon119, page 688
   The principal force and property of hatred then, is to divide, separate, alienate, and elongate a man from what he hates. 1667, George Sikes, chapter 15, in The Book of Nature Translated and Epitomiz’d, London, section 2, page 77
4. (intransitive, obsolete) To depart to, or be at, a distance (from something); especially, to appear to recede from the sun, as a planet in its orbit.
   … about Capo Frio in Brasilia, the south point varieth twelve degrees unto the West, and about the mouth of the Straites of Magellan five or six; but elongating from the coast of Brasilia toward the shore of Africa it varyeth Eastward, 1646, Thomas Browne, chapter 2, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica, volume book2, London: E. Dod, page 63

adj

1. Lengthened, extended, elongated; relatively long and slender.
   Painted turtles lay oval, elongate eggs.
   He stood in the shadow of the pagoda, achieving a kinship between the building and himself by his elongate elegance, an air of old, uninsisting nobility. 1958, Han Suyin, chapter 11, in The Mountain Is Young, New York: Putnam, page 341
   He tilted the glass slightly now, the surface of the liquid assuming an elongate outline. 1976, Don DeLillo, chapter 3, in Ratner's Star, New York: Vintage, 1980, page 46
   The teeth [of Thaumatomyrmex ants] are sometimes so elongate that when the mandibles are closed, the largest pair curve all around the opposite side of the head and stick out behind its posterior rim. 2006, E. O. Wilson, chapter 6, in The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth, volume Part1, New York: Norton, page 59