smother

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smoth|er /sm'ʌðər/ (smothers smothering smothered)
1 [VERB] V n
If you smother a fire, you cover it with something in order to put it out.
The girl's parents were also burned as they tried to smother the flames.
2 [VERB] V n
To smother someone means to kill them by covering their face with something so that they cannot breathe.
A father was secretly filmed as he tried to smother his six-week-old son in hospital.
= suffocate
3 [VERB] V n
Things that smother something cover it completely.
Once the shrubs begin to smother the little plants, we have to move them.
4 [VERB] V n
If you smother someone, you show your love for them too much and protect them too much.
She loved her own children, almost smothering them with love.
5 [VERB] V n, V-ed
If you smother an emotion or a reaction, you control it so that people do not notice it.
She summoned up all her pity for him, to smother her self-pity.
...smothered giggles.
= stifle
6 [VERB] be V-ed, V n
If an activity or process is smothered, it is prevented from continuing or developing.
Intellectual life in France was smothered by the occupation...
The debts of both Poland and Hungary are beginning to smother the reform process.
= stifle

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