Lure
noun, verb ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 Something that tempts or attracts, especially one with a promise of reward or pleasure. also, figuratively
"How many have with a smile made small account Of Beauty and her lures"
- 2 Alternative form of lur. alt-of, alternative
- 3 something used to lure fish or other animals into danger so they can be trapped or killed wordnet
- 4 An artificial bait attached to a fishing line to attract fish.
- 5 qualities that attract by seeming to promise some kind of reward wordnet
Show 3 more definitions
- 6 A bunch of feathers attached to a line, used in falconry to recall the hawk.
"My Faulcon now is ſharpe and paſſing emptie, / And til ſhe ſtoope ſhe muſt not be full gorg'd, / For then ſhe never lookes upon her lure."
- 7 anything that serves as an enticement wordnet
- 8 A velvet smoothing brush.
- 1 To attract by temptation, appeal, or guile. transitive
"It had been sixteen years since the BBC’s Grace Wyndham Goldie wrote her internal memo about luring him back to make sociological/scientific TV programmes. Now a second note had circulated, from the science department, proposing that he should present the Corporation’s next educative megaseries."
- 2 provoke someone to do something through (often false or exaggerated) promises or persuasion wordnet
- 3 To attract fish with a lure. transitive
- 4 To recall a hawk with a lure. transitive
Example
More examples"I could not resist the lure of great profits."
Etymology
From Anglo-Norman lure, from Old French loirre (Modern French leurre), from Frankish *lōþr, from Proto-Germanic *lōþr-, perhaps ultimately related to *laþō (“invitation, calling”), or from Proto-Indo-European *leh₂- (“to hide”). Compare English allure, also from Old French. Probably related to German Luder (“bait”).
Borrowed from Icelandic lúðr.
Related phrases
More for "lure"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.