Search the Dictionary

That may be retrieved or recovered; admitting of retrieval. -- Re*triev"a*ble*ness, n. -- Re*triev"a*bly, adv.

The act retrieving.

To find again; to recover; to regain; to restore from loss or injury; as, to retrieve one's character; to retrieve independence. With late repentance now they would retrieve The bodies they forsook, and wish to live. Dryden

Retrieval.

One who retrieves.

To trim again.

Refuse; dregs. [R.]

A prefix or combining form signifying backward, back; as, retroact, to act backward; retrospect, a looking back.

To act backward, or in return; to act in opposition; to be retrospective.

Action returned, or action backward.

Fitted or designed to retroact; operating by returned action; affecting what is past; retrospective. Beddoes. Retroactive law or statute (Law), one which operates to make criminal or punishable, or in any way expressly to affect, acts done prior to the passing of the law.

In a retroactive manner.

To cede or grant back; as, to retrocede a territory to a former proprietor.

Disposed or likely to retrocede; -- said of diseases which go from one part of the body to another, as the gout.

The act of retroceding.

Any extension of a church behind the higggggggh altar, as a chapel; also, in an apsidal church, all the space beyond the line of the back or eastern face of the altar.

Copulating backward, or from behind.

Copulation from behind. Sir T. Browne.

A leading or bringing back.

Reflexed; bent or turned abruptly backward.