to go back
287
2.3
- phrasal verb
- /ɡoʊ bæk/
:
remontarse a
- The history of the building goes back to the 18th century.
- go back to the beginning
- go back many generations
- go back in history
It always seems to go back to childhood.
- It always seems to go back to childhood.
- We have evidence of this going back centuries.
- My belief systems, right, It always goes back to belief systems.
- Almost everything that we humans do goes back to our earliest ancestors, right?
- It is and completely dysfunctional goes back to my thesis.
Examples
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I guess now I should call you Charlie since we go back, huh?
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It always seems to go back to childhood.
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So we just sort of, you know, went back to the old school way.
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Things will not quite go back to the way they were.
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Now we're going back to the online Nation days.
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But I am going back out there because it's my job.
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Let's go back to Vegas.
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I'm going back to bed.
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I've decided to go back to college.
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The history of GAP goes back to the foundations of the Turkish Republic.
Academic text (2013)
Synonyms
95
3.0
To come from an earlier time
18
3.4
To exist since a certain time in the past
7
8.0
To be like something from an earlier time or to mention it
How Far Back
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'to have existed or started in the past' is directly derivable from combining 'go' (move) with 'back' (to an earlier time/place): the idea of moving backward maps transparently onto temporal origin. This motion+particle compositional pattern is common in English and would be predictable to a B1 learner who knows both constituents.
Etymology
Go back gives the image of following a path or line backward to an earlier time, like tracing a story back to its old start. So it means 'to have started' or 'to come from' a past time.