differ
/ˈdɪfə
/- Comparisons are difficult, since circumstances differed from place to place and from one decade to another.
- I still remember the taste of those eggs, which differed from normal ones I had every morning.
- All have obvious, if widely differing, talents but so far none has managed to capitalise upon them.
Synonyms
- He said however that he differed on the subject of war and would set out his point of view accordingly.
- Do the majority and dissenting opinions differ about how to characterize them?
- The most common wrangles are on a founder leader differing with others who troop out to form new churches.
Synonyms
Phrases
agree to differ
beg to differ
Origin
Late Middle English (also in the sense 'put off, defer'): from Old French differer 'differ, defer', from Latin differre, from dis- 'from, away' + ferre 'bring, carry'. Compare with defer1.
refer from Late Middle English:
Refer comes from Latin referre ‘carry back’, from re- ‘back’ and ferre ‘bring’. Referee dates from the early 17th century, but did not appear in sports contexts until the mid 19th century. Referre is also the source of mid 19th-century referendum from the Latin for ‘referring’. Ferre is the source of numerous words in English including confer ‘bring together’; defer ‘put to one side or away’, which shares an origin with differ; fertile ‘bearing’; and transfer ‘carry across’, all of which came into the language in the Late Middle English period.