To convert, as any animal or vegetable matter, into stone or stony substance.

To make callous or obdurate; to stupefy; to paralyze; to transform; as by petrifaction; as, to petrify the heart. Young.

To become stone, or of a stony hardness, as organic matter by calcareous deposits.

Fig.: To become stony, callous, or obdurate.

To convert into stone or a stony substance.

cause to become stone-like or stiff or dazed and stunned; "The horror petrified his feelings"; "Fear petrified her thinking"

change into stone; "the wood petrified with time"

make rigid and set into a conventional pattern; "rigidify the training schedule"; "ossified teaching methods"; "slogans petrify our thinking"