Other forms: multiplied, multiplying, multiplies
To multiply is to increase a number by a stated number of times. Multiply by four, multiplied together, multiply it out.
It is one of the four basic operations, and multiplying by a number less than one makes things smaller, which surprises about half of everybody. Of living things, multiply means to breed and increase: bacteria multiply. Of problems it means to grow in number: the difficulties multiplied. Note multiplication, multiple; and that the multiplication table is the thing most adults remember least fondly from school.
1verbmultiplyTo increase a number by a stated number of times.
“If you multiply three by five, you get fifteen.”
2verbgrowTo grow greatly in number.
“Complaints multiplied after the company changed its delivery service.”
multiply is an increasing.
Latin multiplicare is multus, many, plus plicare, to fold. Multiplying is folding many times, which is exactly what happens if you fold a piece of paper and count the layers.
Latin
multiplicō
Old French
multiplier
English, today
multiply
Built from
From Old French multiplier, from Latin multiplicō, from multi (“many”) + plicō (“to fold”). The noun presumably derives from the verb.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA