give the gate

1. 1.

   terminate a relationship abruptly

   “Mary gave John the axe after she saw him with another woman”

   Synonymsgive the axegive the bounce

   Broaderseparate

Questions about give the gate

What does give the gate mean?

give the gate means "terminate a relationship abruptly".

What is another word for give the gate?

Close synonyms include give the axe, give the bounce. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is give the gate a common word?

give the gate is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.