<B>combative, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> ready to fight or oppose; fond of fighting. <BR> <I>Ex. A good football team has a combative spirit.</I> (SYN) pugnacious. adv. <B>combatively.</B> noun <B>combativeness.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="combativity">
<B>combativity, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the quality or character of being combative; disposition to fight; pugnacity. <BR> <I>Ex. The judges stopped the bout in the second round and disqualified him for lack of combativity (New Yorker).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="combatneurosis">
<B>combat neurosis,</B> <B>=shell shock.</B></DL>
<A NAME="combatready">
<B>combat-ready, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> trained or tested for combat; fully prepared or equipped militarily. <BR> <I>Ex. a combat-ready, efficient armed force.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="combatteam">
<B>combat team,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a force composed of two or more units of different military branches acting together in battle. <BR> <I>Ex. In the line it was not called a regiment but a combat team, for it was composed of the 18th Infantry plus a battalion of field artillery and mobile anti-tank guns (Ralph Ingersoll).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="combatzone">
<B>combat zone,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a region in a theater of operations where fighting takes place, extending from the front line to a line or boundary designated by the theater commander. <DD><B> 2. </B>any area where combat takes place or is expected. </DL>
<A NAME="combe">
<B>combe, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a deep hollow surrounded on three sides by hills; narrow valley. Also, <B>comb,</B> <B>coom,</B> <B>coomb.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="combedyarn">
<B>combed yarn,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> yarn made from fibers which have been straightened and separated from short fibers and tangles. </DL>
<A NAME="comber">
<B>comber, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B><B>=breaker.</B> <DD><B> 2. </B>a person or thing that combs. </DL>
<A NAME="combfootedspider">
<B>comb-footed spider,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> any one of certain spiders having movable spines on the posterior legs, used to curl and bind the lines of silk coming from the spinnerets. </DL>
<A NAME="combfoundation">
<B>comb foundation,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a thin sheet of beeswax made to resemble the middle wall of a honeycomb and placed in a hive for the bees to build upon. </DL>
<A NAME="combhoney">
<B>comb honey,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> honey in the comb, or still containing portions of comb; unstrained honey. </DL>
<A NAME="combinability">
<B>combinability, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the fact or condition of being combinable. </DL>
<A NAME="combination">
<B>combination, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the act or process of combining. <BR> <I>Ex. The combination of flour and water makes paste.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>the state of being combined; union. <BR> <I>Ex. The same images in the same combination (Samuel Johnson).</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>one whole made by combining two or more different things. <BR> <I>Ex. The color purple is a combination of red and blue.</I> <DD><B> 4a. </B>persons or groups joined together for some common purpose. <BR> <I>Ex. The farmers formed a combination to sell their crops at better prices.</I> (SYN) league, combine. <DD><B> b. </B>(U.S.) an agreement, arrangement, or organization set up especially to secure illegal trading advantages. <BR> <I>Ex. a combination in restraint of trade.</I> (SYN) conspiracy. <DD><B> 5a. </B>the series of numbers or letters dialed in opening a combination lock. <BR> <I>Ex. Do you know the combination of the safe?</I> <DD><B> b. </B><B>=combination lock.</B> <BR> <I>Ex. When the boy had gone he opened his safe again, moving the knob of the combination first left to 32--his age, secondly right to 10--the year of his birth, left again to 65 (Graham Greene).</I> <DD><B> 6. </B>(Mathematics.) <DD><B> a. </B>the arrangement or arranging of figures, letters, etc., in groups so that each group has a certain number of individuals. <DD><B> b. </B>the group thus formed. Possible two-letter combinations of <I>a, b,</I> and <I>c</I> are <I>ab, ac,</I> and <I>bc.</I> <DD><B> 7. </B>(Chemistry.) <DD><B> a. </B>the union of substances to form a compound. <DD><B> b. </B>the resulting product or compound. <DD><B> 8. </B>a suit of underwear having the shirt and drawers in one piece. </DL>
<A NAME="combinational">
<B>combinational, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of or having to do with combination. </DL>
<A NAME="combinationdoor">
<B>combination door,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a storm door with a panel or panels that can be removed and replaced with screens in the summer. </DL>
<A NAME="combinationlock">
<B>combination lock,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a lock having a movable dial with numbers or letters on it. The lock will not open until the dial has been turned to certain numbers or letters in a certain order and a certain direction. </DL>
<A NAME="combinationroom">
<B>combination room,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> one of the common rooms at the University of Cambridge in England. <BR> <I>Ex. We returned to the combination room, and took our places for wine (C. P. Snow).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="combinationtone">
<B>combination tone,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Physics.) one of the tones generated through aural distortion by the sounding of two tones simultaneously, with a frequency equal to the sum or the difference of the frequencies of the sounded tones. </DL>
<A NAME="combinative">
<B>combinative, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>tending to combine; combining. <DD><B> 2. </B>having to do with combination. <DD><B> 3. </B>(Phonetics.) taking place through a combination of neighboring sounds. Dissimilation and metathesis are examples of combinative sound changes. </DL>
<A NAME="combinatorial">
<B>combinatorial, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>combinational. <DD><B> 2. </B>of or having to do with combinatorics. <BR> <I>Ex. The combinatorial problem here involves 500 vans, 1,000 drivers, 5,000 services, five garages, 16 canteens (Sunday Times).</I> adv. <B>combinatorially.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="combinatorialanalysis">
<B>combinatorial analysis,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the branch of higher mathematics which deals with analysis by means of combinations, permutations, etc. </DL>
<A NAME="combinatorialtopology">
<B>combinatorial topology,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Geometry.) the branch of topology which deals with forms reduced to combinations of the simplest geometric figures. </DL>
<A NAME="combinatorics">
<B>combinatorics, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Mathematics.) the study of the permutations and combinations of elements in finite sets. <BR> <I>Ex. A final example of combinatorics can be expressed as a problem in genealogy (Scientific American).</I> </DL>
<B>combine, </B>verb, <B>-bined,</B> <B>-bining,</B> noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><I>v.t. </I> <B>1. </B>to join things, persons, or groups together; unite. <BR> <I>Ex. to combine work and play. Our club combined the offices of secretary and treasurer so that one person could do the work of both. A sense of common danger might ... combine them in operations of defense (James Mill).</I> (SYN) associate, ally, mix. <DD><B> 2. </B>to have or show in union or combination. <BR> <I>Ex. (Figurative.) a position which ... combined ... strength, beauty, and fertility (Arthur Stanley).</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>to harvest with a combine. <BR> <I>Ex. Rains have knocked down the wheat in some fields, made it too moist to combine in others (Wall Street Journal).</I> <DD><I>v.i. </I> <B>1. </B>to unite or join; come together for a common purpose; form a combination. <BR> <I>Ex. The great landlords and the financiers had combined against the small bourgeoisie and the workers (Edmund Wilson).</I> (SYN) confederate. <DD><B> 2. </B>to unite to form a chemical compound. <BR> <I>Ex. Two atoms of hydrogen combine with one of oxygen to form water.</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>to harvest with a combine. <BR> <I>Ex. Shall we start combining or do we wait until the grain has lost further 1 per cent of moisture? (London Times).</I> <DD><I>noun </I> <B>1. </B>a group of people joined together for some common purpose; combination. <BR> <I>Ex. His brother ... became the editor of the Socialist Daily Herald ... owned by the capitalist publishing combine of Odham's (Maclean's).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>(U.S.) a machine for harvesting and threshing grain, soybeans, etc. It cuts the stalks and separates the seeds from them as it moves across a field. <BR> <I>Ex. The chemical revolution on the farm is as responsible for the farmer's zooming production as his tractor and combine (Newsweek).</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>an artistic work made up of a combination of painting, collage, and construction. <BR> <I>Ex. ... the assemblages and combines of Robert Rauschenberg (New Yorker).</I> adj. <B>combinable.</B> noun <B>combiner.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="combined">
<B>combined, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>joined together; united. <DD><B> 2. </B>done by groups, persons, or things acting together. adv. <B>combinedly.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="combinedoperations">
<B>combined operations,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>military operations carried on by two or more allies acting together. <DD><B> 2. </B>military operations in which land, sea, and air forces cooperate; amphibious operations. <BR> <I>Ex. They [the troops] cannot land unless, in fact, combined operations are carried out (Lord Louis Mountbatten).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="combing">
<B>combing, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the act of a person or thing that combs. <BR><I>expr. <B>combings,</B> </I>hairs removed by a comb. </DL>
<A NAME="combingjacket">
<B>combing jacket,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a loose jacket worn while dressing the hair. <BR> <I>Ex. That was the era when ladies slipped on combing jackets before brushing their long, unpermanented hair (New Yorker).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="combingwool">
<B>combing wool,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> wool fibers over two inches long. </DL>
<A NAME="combiningform">
<B>combining form,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a form of a word used for combining with other words or other combining forms to make new words. (Examples:) <BR> <I>Ex. Psycho- + analysis = psychoanalysis; Franco- + -phile = Francophile; micro- + -graph = micrograph.</I> In <I>psychoanalysis, psycho-</I> is a combining form meaning "mind"; in <I>Francophile, Franco-</I> is a combining form meaning "French," and <I>-phile</I> is a combining form meaning "a person who is fond of"; in <I>micrograph, micro-</I> is a combining form meaning "small; microscopic" and <I>-graph</I> is a combining form meaning "an instrument that records," or "something drawn or recorded." </DL>
