1. To swallow up, to include or take a thing into the loss of its separate existence; to incorporate.
2. To be swallowed up, or comprised in, so as to no longer exist separately.
3. To engross, or to completely engage the attention or faculties.
4. To take up (imponderable agents) by chemical or molecular action.
5. To assume the burden of (costs, expenses, etc.).
6. To take in (a shock, jolt, etc.) with little or no recoil or reaction.
7. To take in and not to reflect (light rays are absorbed by black surfaces, cork ceilings absorb sound).

Capable of absorbing moisture, light rays, etc.; a thing or substance that absorbs.

Causing absorption, drying up.

The quality of being absorbent; absorptiveness.

Any substance which absorbs fluids through its sensible or insensible porosity; applied in a special sense in medicine to such substances as chalk, magnesia, which absorb the acidity of the stomach.

To remove (a substance, etc.) from the surface upon which it is adsorbed.

To absorb anew or again; to take in again by absorption.

A substance or preparation causing absorption.