vitalize

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   to give energy, vigor, or renewed activity to someone or something

   The new director's ideas vitalized the struggling arts program.

2. 2
   verb

   to endow with life or a life-giving principle; animate

   Early physiologists believed that a special force vitalized living tissue.

Formed in English from vital + -ize. Vital comes through Middle English and Old French from Latin vitalis, 'of or belonging to life,' from vita, 'life,' related to vivere, 'to live.' The suffix -ize makes the causative sense literal: to make vital or supply with life and vigor.

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