Re*duce" (r&esl;*dūs"), v. t.
[imp. & p. p. Reduced (-dūst"),;
p. pr. & vb. n. Reducing (-
dū"s&ibreve;ng).] [L. reducere, reductum; pref.
red-. re-, re- + ducere to lead. See
Duke, and cf. Redoubt, n.]
1. To bring or lead back to any former place or
condition. [Obs.]
And to his brother's house reduced his
wife.
Chapman.
The sheep must of necessity be scattered, unless the
great Shephered of souls oppose, or some of his delegates
reduce and direct us.
Evelyn.
2. To bring to any inferior state, with
respect to rank, size, quantity, quality, value, etc.; to diminish; to
lower; to degrade; to impair; as, to reduce a sergeant to the
ranks; to reduce a drawing; to reduce expenses; to
reduce the intensity of heat. "An ancient but
reduced family." Sir W. Scott.
Nothing so excellent but a man may fasten upon
something belonging to it, to reduce it.
Tillotson.
Having reduced
Their foe to misery beneath their fears.
Milton.
Hester Prynne was shocked at the condition to which she
found the clergyman reduced.
Hawthorne.
3. To bring to terms; to humble; to conquer;
to subdue; to capture; as, to reduce a province or a
fort.
4. To bring to a certain state or condition by
grinding, pounding, kneading, rubbing, etc.; as, to reduce a
substance to powder, or to a pasty mass; to reduce fruit, wood,
or paper rags, to pulp.
It were but right
And equal to reduce me to my dust.
Milton.
5. To bring into a certain order, arrangement,
classification, etc.; to bring under rules or within certain limits of
descriptions and terms adapted to use in computation; as, to
reduce animals or vegetables to a class or classes; to
reduce a series of observations in astronomy; to reduce
language to rules.
6. (Arith.) (a) To
change, as numbers, from one denomination into another without
altering their value, or from one denomination into others of the same
value; as, to reduce pounds, shillings, and pence to pence, or
to reduce pence to pounds; to reduce days and hours to
minutes, or minutes to days and hours. (b)
To change the form of a quantity or expression without altering
its value; as, to reduce fractions to their lowest terms, to a
common denominator, etc.
7. (Chem.) To bring to the metallic
state by separating from impurities; hence, in general, to remove
oxygen from; to deoxidize; to combine with, or to subject to the
action of, hydrogen; as, ferric iron is reduced to ferrous
iron; or metals are reduced from their ores; -- opposed to
oxidize.
8. (Med.) To restore to its proper
place or condition, as a displaced organ or part; as, to reduce
a dislocation, a fracture, or a hernia.
Reduced iron (Chem.), metallic iron
obtained through deoxidation of an oxide of iron by exposure to a
current of hydrogen or other reducing agent. When hydrogen is used the
product is called also iron by hydrogen. -- To
reduce an equation (Alg.), to bring the unknown
quantity by itself on one side, and all the known quantities on the
other side, without destroying the equation. -- To reduce
an expression (Alg.), to obtain an equivalent
expression of simpler form. -- To reduce a
square (Mil.), to reform the line or column from
the square.
Syn. -- To diminish; lessen; decrease; abate; shorten;
curtail; impair; lower; subject; subdue; subjugate; conquer.
