LET ALONE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does let alone mean? 

• LET ALONE (verb)
  The verb LET ALONE has 1 sense:

1. leave unchanged or undisturbed or refrain from taking

  Familiarity information: LET ALONE used as a verb is very rare.

• LET ALONE (adverb)
  The adverb LET ALONE has 1 sense:

1. much less

  Familiarity information: LET ALONE used as an adverb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• LET ALONE (verb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Leave unchanged or undisturbed or refrain from taking

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

leave; leave alone; leave behind; let alone

Context example:

leave the flowers that you see in the park behind

Hypernyms (to "let alone" is one way to...):

forbear; refrain (resist doing something)

Verb group:

leave (have left or have as a remainder)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "let alone"):

let (leave unchanged)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody
Something ----s somebody
Something ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody PP
Somebody ----s something PP

• LET ALONE (adverb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Much less

Synonyms:

let alone; not to mention

Context example:

she can't boil potatoes, let alone cook a meal

 Context examples 

There were cats at the houses the master visited that must be let alone.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Her hair she had the sense to let alone, after gathering up the thick waves and curls into a Hebe-like knot at the back of her head.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

I'm on your side now, hand and glove; and I shouldn't wish for to see the party weakened, let alone yourself, seeing as I know what I owes you.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Yes, my precious; and I think I should be more independent altogether, you see; let alone my working with a better heart in my own house, than I could in anybody else's now.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

It is as fine a picture as any Miss Reed's drawing-master could paint, let alone the young ladies themselves, who could not come near it: and have you learnt French?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

He was a fool to have ever left them, he thought; and he was very certain that his sum of happiness would have been greater had he remained with them and let alone the books and the people who sat in the high places.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

“I would have you to know, clerk, that I am a free English burgher, and that I dare say my mind to our father the Pope himself, let alone such a lacquey's lacquey as you!”

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He was now fixed on the far east of the northern shore, on the east of the southern shore, and on the south. The north and west were surely never meant to be left out of his diabolical scheme—let alone the City itself and the very heart of fashionable London in the south-west and west. I went back to Smollet, and asked him if he could tell us if any other boxes had been taken from Carfax.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

So the dogs came to understand that when the team stopped by order, White Fang was to be let alone.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Aunt and Flo were poorly all the way, and liked to be let alone, so when I had done what I could for them, I went and enjoyed myself.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)