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# devolve

«devolve» in Mova's school dictionary: **to pass a duty, power or job on to another person, often…** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

### part of speech

verb (devolve, devolves, devolved, devolving) (formal)

### meaning for a pupil

To devolve is to pass a duty, power or job on to another person, often because the first person is no longer able to do it. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/D/devolve/#m1)

### sense in the lessons

in stories a command or responsibility moves from an old leader to a younger one.

### examples

- The duty of guarding the gate devolved on the youngest guard. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/D/devolve/#x1)
- When the king grew old, rule devolved upon his son. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/D/devolve/#x2)
- The task devolved to me after the captain fell ill. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/D/devolve/#x3)

### note

nothing for maths

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «devolve» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/D/devolve/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.