Definition of "avoid"
avoid
verb
third-person singular simple present avoids, present participle avoiding, simple past and past participle avoided
to keep away from; to keep clear of; to stay away from
Quotations
He still hoped that he might be able to win some chiefs who remained neutral; and he carefully avoided every act which could goad them into open hostility.
1848, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 13, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume 3, Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, page 309
England could have met world and European champions Spain but that eventuality was avoided by Sweden's 2-0 win against France, and Rooney's first goal in a major tournament since scoring twice in the 4-2 victory over Croatia in Lisbon at Euro 2004.
2012 June 19, Phil McNulty, “England 1-0 Ukraine”, in BBC Sport
To try not to do something or to have something happen
Quotations
Then he realized, by the immobility of the other children and by the way they avoided looking at him, that it was he who was selected for punishment.
1953, James Baldwin, Go Tell It on the Mountain (A Laurel Book), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing Co., published December 1985, part 1 (The Seventh Day), page 20
(transitive, law) To defeat or evade; to invalidate.
Quotations
[…] in an action for trespassing upon land whereof the plaintiff is seised, if the defendant shews a title to the land by descent, and that therefore he had a right to enter, and gives colour to the plaintiff, the plaintiff may either traverse and totally deny the fact of the descent; or he may confess and avoid it, by replying, that true it is that such descent happened, but that since the descent the defendant himself demised the lands to the plaintiff for term of life.
1765–1769, William Blackstone, chapter 20, in Commentaries on the Laws of England, (please specify |book=I to IV), Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] Clarendon Press
(transitive, obsolete) To emit or throw out; to void.
Quotations
[…] the citie of Memi, where is a great Caue or Denne, in the whiche is a spryng or fountayne that contynually auoydeth a great quantitie of Bitumen […]
1577, Richard Eden (translator), The History of Trauayle in the West and East Indies [De Orbo Novo, Decades 1-3] by Peter Martyr d’Anghiera, London, “Of the ordinary nauigation from Spayne to the west Indies,” p. 224b
[…] a Toad pisseth not, nor doe they containe those urinary parts which are found in other animals, to avoid that serous excretion […]
1650, Thomas Browne, chapter 13, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], 3rd book, page 136
(transitive, obsolete) To leave, evacuate; to leave as empty, to withdraw or come away from.
Quotations
Anone they encountred to gyders / and he with the reed shelde smote hym soo hard that he bare hym ouer to the erthe / There with anone came another Knyght of the castel / and he was smyten so sore that he auoyded his fadel(please add an English translation of this quotation)
1485, Sir Thomas Malory, “xvij”, in Le Morte Darthur, book X
This yeare also was a proclamation made in London, and throughout all the realme, that all strangers should auoid the land before the feast of saint Michaell then next following except those that came with merchandize.
1587, Raphael Holinshed et al., “Henrie the third”, in The First and Second Volumes of Chronicles, page 202
(transitive, obsolete) To get rid of.
Quotations
[…] the spirit of my father, which I think is within me, begins to mutiny against this servitude. I will no longer endure it, though yet I know no wise remedy how to avoid it.
c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene i]
(intransitive, obsolete) To retire; to withdraw, depart, go away.
Quotations
Pray you, poor gentleman, take up some other station; here’s no place for you; pray you, avoid:
c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act IV, scene v]