POLICE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does police mean? 

• POLICE (noun)
  The noun POLICE has 1 sense:

1. the force of policemen and officers

  Familiarity information: POLICE used as a noun is very rare.

• POLICE (verb)
  The verb POLICE has 1 sense:

1. maintain the security of by carrying out a patrol

  Familiarity information: POLICE used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• POLICE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The force of policemen and officers

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

constabulary; law; police; police force

Context example:

the law came looking for him

Hypernyms ("police" is a kind of...):

force; personnel (group of people willing to obey orders)

law enforcement agency (an agency responsible for insuring obedience to the laws)

Meronyms (members of "police"):

officer; police officer; policeman (a member of a police force)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "police"):

European Law Enforcement Organisation; Europol (police organization for the European Union; aims to improve effectiveness and cooperation among European police forces)

gendarmerie; gendarmery (French police force; a group of gendarmes or gendarmes collectively)

Mutawa; Mutawa'een (religious police in Saudi Arabia whose duty is to ensure strict adherence to established codes of conduct; offenders may be detained indefinitely; foreigners are not excluded)

Mounties; RCMP; Royal Canadian Mounted Police (the federal police force of Canada)

New Scotland Yard; Scotland Yard (the detective department of the metropolitan police force of London)

secret police (a police force that operates in secrecy (usually against persons suspected of treason or sedition))

Schutzstaffel; SS (special police force in Nazi Germany founded as a personal bodyguard for Adolf Hitler in 1925; the SS administered the concentration camps)

posse; posse comitatus (a temporary police force)

Derivation:

police (maintain the security of by carrying out a patrol)

• POLICE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they police    ... he / she / it polices   
Past simple: policed   
Past participle: policed   
-ing form: policing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Maintain the security of by carrying out a patrol

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Synonyms:

patrol; police

Hypernyms (to "police" is one way to...):

guard (to keep watch over)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

police (the force of policemen and officers)

 Context examples 

"You know what that means. You'll be in the police court yet."

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

That was the state of things, Watson, when upon the Tuesday morning I, at the request of Major Murphy, went down to Aldershot to supplement the efforts of the police.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He denied strenuously having ever seen Mr. Neville St. Clair and swore that the presence of the clothes in his room was as much a mystery to him as to the police.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

And with the same grave countenance he hurried through his breakfast and drove to the police station, whither the body had been carried.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

If the police interview a witness to a crime, for example, their repeated questioning about selected details might lead the witness to forget information that could later prove important.

(Selective amnesia: how rats and humans are able to actively forget distracting memories, University of Cambridge)

When I learned that the police had failed——

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“Our police work ends, but our legal work begins.”

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

We shall leave him where the police will find him, as on the other night; and then to home.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

And further, the police had arranged in two or three places deposits of grub for dog and man, and he was travelling light.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

Usually this occurred at night, so as to avoid interference from the mounted police of the Territory.

(White Fang, by Jack London)