wind
English
Etymology 1
From Middle English winde, wind, from Old English wind (“wind”), from Proto-Germanic *windaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wéh₁n̥ts (“wind”) (non-Anatolian Proto-Indo-European *h₂wéh₁n̥tos (“wind”)) derived from the present participle of *h₂weh₁- (“to blow”). Cognate with Dutch wind, German Wind, West Frisian wyn, Norwegian and Swedish vind, Icelandic vindur, Latin ventus, Welsh gwynt, Sanskrit वात (vāta) ,Russian ветер (veter) ,perhaps Albanian bundë (“strong damp wind”).
Pronunciation
- enPR: wĭnd, IPA(key): /ˈwɪnd/
- (archaic) enPR: wīnd, IPA(key): /ˈwaɪnd/
Audio (UK) (file) Audio (US) (file) - Rhymes: -ɪnd
Noun
wind (countable and uncountable, plural winds)
- (countable, uncountable) Real or perceived movement of atmospheric air usually caused by convection or differences in air pressure.
- The wind blew through her hair as she stood on the deck of the ship.
- As they accelerated onto the motorway, the wind tore the plywood off the car's roof-rack.
- The winds in Chicago are fierce.
- There was a sudden gust of wind.
- 2013 June 29, “Unspontaneous combustion”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8842, page 29:
- Since the mid-1980s, when Indonesia first began to clear its bountiful forests on an industrial scale in favour of lucrative palm-oil plantations, “haze” has become an almost annual occurrence in South-East Asia. The cheapest way to clear logged woodland is to burn it, producing an acrid cloud of foul white smoke that, carried by the wind, can cover hundreds, or even thousands, of square miles.
- Air artificially put in motion by any force or action.
- the wind of a cannon ball; the wind of a bellows
- (countable, uncountable) The ability to breathe easily.
- After the second lap he was already out of wind.
- The fall knocked the wind out of him.
- Shakespeare
- If my wind were but long enough to say my prayers, I would repent.
- News of an event, especially by hearsay or gossip. (Used with catch, often in the past tense.)
- Steve caught wind of Martha's dalliance with his best friend.
- (India and Japan) One of the five basic elements (see Wikipedia article on the Classical elements).
- (uncountable, colloquial) Flatus.
- Eww. Someone just passed wind.
- Breath modulated by the respiratory and vocal organs, or by an instrument.
- John Dryden
- Their instruments were various in their kind, / Some for the bow, and some for breathing wind.
- John Dryden
- (music) The woodwind section of an orchestra. Occasionally also used to include the brass section.
- A direction from which the wind may blow; a point of the compass; especially, one of the cardinal points, which are often called the "four winds".
- Bible, Ezekiel xxxvii. 9
- Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain.
- 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 5, in The Celebrity:
- When this conversation was repeated in detail within the hearing of the young woman in question, and undoubtedly for his benefit, Mr. Trevor threw shame to the winds and scandalized the Misses Brewster then and there by proclaiming his father to have been a country storekeeper.
- Bible, Ezekiel xxxvii. 9
- Types of playing-tile in the game of mah-jongg, named after the four winds.
- A disease of sheep, in which the intestines are distended with air, or rather affected with a violent inflammation. It occurs immediately after shearing.
- Mere breath or talk; empty effort; idle words.
- John Milton
- Nor think thou with wind / Of airy threats to awe.
- 1946, George Orwell, Politics and the English Language
- Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.
- John Milton
- A bird, the dotterel.
- (boxing, slang) The region of the solar plexus, where a blow may paralyze the diaphragm and cause temporary loss of breath or other injury.
Synonyms
- (movement of air): breeze, draft, gale; see also Thesaurus:wind
- (flatus): gas (US); see also Thesaurus:flatus
Derived terms
- break wind
- close to the wind
- crosswind
- downwind
- fair wind
- foul wind
- get one's wind back
- get the wind up
- get wind of
- headwind
- it's an ill wind that blows nobody any good
- katabatic wind
- like the wind
- long-winded
- pass wind
- sail close to the wind
- scattered to the four winds
- second wind
- see which way the wind is blowing
- sow the wind and reap the whirlwind
- stormwind
- tailwind
- the winds
- take the wind out of someone's sails
- three sheets to the wind
- throw caution to the wind
- throw to the wind
- trade wind
- twist in the wind
- upwind
- which way the wind is blowing
- whirlwind
- whistle in the wind
- willow in the wind
- wind at one's back
- windbag
- wind band
- wind-blown
- windboard
- windbound
- wind-break, windbreak
- windbreaker
- wind-breaker
- windburn
- wind chart
- wind-cheater, windcheater
- windchill
- wind chimes
- wind cone, windcone
- wind egg
- windfall
- wind farm
- windflaw
- wind force
- wind gauge
- wind generator
- wind gun
- wind instrument
- windily
- windiness
- windjammer
- windless
- windmill
- window
- windpipe
- wind power
- windpump
- wind rose
- wind scale
- windscreen
- wind shake
- windshield
- wind sleeve, windsleeve
- wind sock, windsock
- winds of change
- windstorm
- windsurf
- windsurfer
- windsurfing
- wind-swept, windswept
- wind tunnel
- wind turbine
- windward
- windy
Translations
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
See also
Verb
wind (third-person singular simple present winds, present participle winding, simple past and past participle winded or (proscribed) wound)
- (transitive) To blow air through a wind instrument or horn to make a sound.
- 1913, Edith Constance Holme, Crump Folk Going Home, page 136:
- Something higher must lie at the back of that eager response to pack-music and winded horn — something born of the smell of the good earth
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- (transitive) To cause (someone) to become breathless, often by a blow to the abdomen.
- The boxer was winded during round two.
- (reflexive) To exhaust oneself to the point of being short of breath.
- I can’t run another step — I’m winded.
- (Britain) To turn a boat or ship around, so that the wind strikes it on the opposite side.
- (transitive) To expose to the wind; to winnow; to ventilate.
- (transitive) To perceive or follow by scent.
- The hounds winded the game.
- (transitive) To rest (a horse, etc.) in order to allow the breath to be recovered; to breathe.
- (transitive) To turn a windmill so that its sails face into the wind.[1]
Usage notes
- The form "wound" in the past is occasionally found in reference to blowing a horn, but is often considered to be erroneous. The October 1875 issue of The Galaxy disparaged this usage as a "very ridiculous mistake" arising from a misunderstanding of the word's meaning.
- A similar solecism occurs in the use (in this sense) of the pronunciation /waɪnd/, sometimes heard in singing and oral reading of verse e.g. The huntsman /waɪndz/ his horn.
Translations
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Etymology 2
From Middle English winden, from Old English windan, from Proto-Germanic *windaną. Compare West Frisian wine, Low German winden, Dutch winden, German winden, Danish vinde, Walloon windea. See also the related term wend.
Pronunciation
- enPR: wīnd, IPA(key): /waɪnd/
Audio (US) (file) - Rhymes: -aɪnd
- Homophones: wined, whined (in accents with the wine-whine merger)
Verb
wind (third-person singular simple present winds, present participle winding, simple past and past participle wound or (archaic) winded)
- (transitive) To turn coils of (a cord or something similar) around something.
- to wind thread on a spool or into a ball
- (Can we date this quote?) John Milton
- Whether to wind / The woodbine round this arbour.
- 1906, Stanley J[ohn] Weyman, chapter I, in Chippinge Borough, New York, N.Y.: McClure, Phillips & Co., OCLC 580270828, page 01:
- It was April 22, 1831, and a young man was walking down Whitehall in the direction of Parliament Street. He wore shepherd's plaid trousers and the swallow-tail coat of the day, with a figured muslin cravat wound about his wide-spread collar.
- (transitive) To tighten the spring of a clockwork mechanism such as that of a clock.
- Please wind that old-fashioned alarm clock.
- To entwist; to enfold; to encircle.
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- Sleep, and I will wind thee in arms.
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- (ergative) To travel, or to cause something to travel, in a way that is not straight.
- Vines wind round a pole. The river winds through the plain.
- (Can we date this quote?) Sir Walter Scott
- He therefore turned him to the steep and rocky path which […] winded through the thickets of wild boxwood and other low aromatic shrubs.
- 1751, Thomas Gray, Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard
- The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea.
- 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 4, in The Celebrity:
- Judge Short had gone to town, and Farrar was off for a three days' cruise up the lake. I was bitterly regretting I had not gone with him when the distant notes of a coach horn reached my ear, and I descried a four-in-hand winding its way up the inn road from the direction of Mohair.
- 1969, Paul McCartney
- The long and winding road / That leads to your door / Will never disappear.
- To have complete control over; to turn and bend at one's pleasure; to vary or alter or will; to regulate; to govern.
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- to turn and wind a fiery Pegasus
- (Can we date this quote?) Robert Herrick
- Gifts blind the wise, and bribes do please / And wind all other witnesses.
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- Were our legislature vested in the prince, he might wind and turn our constitution at his pleasure.
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- To introduce by insinuation; to insinuate.
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- You have contrived […] to wind / Yourself into a power tyrannical.
- (Can we date this quote?) Government of Tongues
- little arts and dexterities they have to wind in such things into discourse
- (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare
- To cover or surround with something coiled about.
- to wind a rope with twine
- To make a winding motion.
Derived terms
Translations
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
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Alemannic German
Etymology
From Old High German wint, from Proto-Germanic *windaz. Cognate with German Wind, Dutch wind, English wind, Icelandic vindur, Gothic 𐍅𐌹𐌽𐌳𐍃 (winds).
References
- “wind” in Patuzzi, Umberto, ed., (2013) Ünsarne Börtar [Our Words], Luserna, Italy: Comitato unitario delle linguistiche storiche germaniche in Italia / Einheitskomitee der historischen deutschen Sprachinseln in Italien
Dutch
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ʋɪnt/
audio (file) - Hyphenation: wind
- Rhymes: -ɪnt
- Homophone: wint
Etymology 1
From Middle Dutch wint, from Old Dutch wint, from Proto-Germanic *windaz, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wéh₁n̥ts (“blowing”), present participle of *h₂weh₁- (“to blow”).
Noun
Derived terms
Etymology 2
From Middle Dutch wint. This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.
Derived terms
Related terms
Etymology 3
See the etymology of the main entry.
Old English
Alternative forms
- ƿind
Etymology
From Proto-Germanic *windaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wéh₁n̥ts (“blowing”), the present participle of *h₂weh₁- (“blow, gust”). Germanic cognates include Old Frisian wind, Old Saxon wind, Dutch wind, Old High German wint (German Wind), Old Norse vindr (Swedish vind), Gothic 𐍅𐌹𐌽𐌳𐍃 (winds). The Indo-European root is also the source of Latin ventus (French vent), Welsh gwynt, Tocharian A want, Tocharian B yente.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /wind/
Derived terms
References
- Rex Wailes (1954) The English Windmill, page 104: “[I]f a windmill is to work as effectively as possible its sails must always face the wind squarely; to effect this some means of turning them into the wind, or winding the mill, must be used.”