conceive

verb

1. 1

   To have a child; to become pregnant (with).

   Assisted procreation can help those trying to conceive.

   She hath also conceived a son in her old age.

2. 2

   To develop; to form in the mind; to imagine.

   It was among the ruins of the Capitol that I first conceived the idea of a work which has amused and exercised near twenty years of my life.

   At the mouth of the cave we found a single litter with six bearers, all of them mutes, waiting, and with them I was relieved to see our old friend Billali, for whom I had conceived a sort of affection.

   There are, moreover, grounds for thinking that the Rosaline of Love’s Labour’s Lost was originally conceived of by Shakespeare as pale with black eyes—...

   The car cost $700 initially. The subsequent cost was mounting out of sight, but I had conceived an extraordinary fondness for the bug, and my sother had conceived an extraordinary fondness for me, so she allowed my passion for the car to ransack our savings.

3. 3

   To imagine (as); to have a conception of; to form a representation of.

   Can you conceive of him as a leader?

   We shall, / As I conceive the journey, be at the Mount / Before you, Lepidus.

   […]you will hardly conceive him to have been bred in the ſame Climate […]

   Now all this was very fine, but not at all in keeping with the Celebrity's character as I had come to conceive it. The idea that adulation ever cloyed on him was ludicrous in itself. In fact I thought the whole story fishy, and came very near to saying so.

4. 4

   To understand (someone).

   I conceive you.

Forms

past tense

conceived

past participle

conceived

present participle

conceiving

third person singular

conceives