curtail
to reduce or cut short something
Word origin: From Old French courtault, cut short, related to Latin curtus, shortened.
Curtail in a sentence
Here are example sentences showing curtail in a sentence.
Budget cuts forced the museum to curtail its evening hours.
Budget cuts forced the museum to curtail its hours and cancel several public programs.
Using “curtail” well
Curtail means to cut short or reduce, often something ongoing such as rights, hours, or spending. It pairs with trim and shorten and implies a deliberate reduction.
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Questions about “curtail”
See these words the way the GRE tests them.
Definitions in isolation do not stick. Sit a free, full-length GRE mock and meet this vocabulary inside real text completion and sentence equivalence questions, with your score and a worked solution for every answer.