blight
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: blīt
ipa: /blaɪt/
rhymes: -aɪt
homophone: blite
Forms: form: blights
form: blighting
form: blighted
form: blighted
form: no-table-tags
form: glossary
form: blight
form: blight
form: blighted
form: blight
form: blightest
form: blighted
form: blightedst
form: blights
form: blighteth
form: blighted
form: blight
form: blighted
form: blight
form: blighted
form: blight
form: -
form: blighting
form: blighted
Etymology: The etymology of the noun is uncertain; suggested derivations include the following:
* possibly related to Middle English blichening (“mildew or rust on grain, blight”), possibly related to Middle English bliken (“to gleam, shine; to turn pale”), from Old English blīcan (“to shine, sparkle”) (whence modern English blike (“(obsolete) to gleam, shine”); also compare Old Norse blikna (“to grow pallid”)), from Proto-West Germanic *blīkan (“to shine”), from Proto-Germanic *blīkaną (“to gleam, shine”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleyǵ- (“to shine”); or
* since sense 2.2 is a diseased condition of the skin, possibly from Middle English *bleighte, *bleȝte, from Old English blǣcþa (“leprosy”) (related to blǣċe (“an itching skin-disease”) and blǣċo (“leprosy; paleness”)), from Proto-West Germanic *blaik, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *blaikaz (“pale; white”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleyǵ- (“to shine”). If so, the word is a doublet of bleak.
The verb is derived from the noun.
Senses: examples: text: But if it happens, as ſometimes it does, that this Vapour bears up along vvith it any noxious mineral Steams, it then blasts Vegetables, eſpecially thoſe vvhich are more young and tender: blights Corn and Fruits: and is ſometimes injurious even to Men vvho chance to be then abroad in the Fields.
ref: 1695, John Woodward, “Part IV. Of the Origin and Formation of Metalls and Minerals.”, in An Essay toward a Natural History of the Earth: And Terrestrial Bodies, Especially Minerals: […], London: […] Ric[hard] Wilkin […], →OCLC, pages 212–213:
text: In your eye there is death, / There is frost on your breath / Which would blight the plants.
ref: 1830 June, Alfred Tennyson, “The Poet’s Mind”, in Poems. […], volume I, London: Edward Moxon, […], published 1842, →OCLC, page 51:
text: Oh, Love! like the blast of the desert thou blightest / The fairest of flowers with thy venomous breath.
ref: 1840 August, “The Talisman”, in The Citizen; a Monthly Journal of Politics, Literature, and Art, volume II, number X, Dublin: Machen and Company, […]; London: Simpkin and Marshall, and Richard Groombridge, →OCLC, stanza IV, page 157:
text: Much is permitted to the power of spirits, so that, being unseen and unperceived, they appear rather in their effects than in their acts: as when some lurking evil in the air blighteth the fruit or grain in the blossom, killeth it in the blade, woundeth it in its full growth, and when the atmosphere tainted in some secret way poureth over the earth its pestilential vapours.
ref: 1842, Tertullian, “The Book of Apology against the Heathen”, in C[harles] Dodgson, transl., edited by E[dward] B[ouverie] P[usey], Tertullian (A Library of Fathers of the Holy Catholic Church, […]; 10), volume I (Apologetic and Practical Treatises), Oxford, Oxfordshire: John Henry Parker; London: J. G. F. and J. Rivington, →OCLC, pages 54–55:
topics: biology
botany
medicine
natural-sciences
pathology
phytopathology
sciences
synonyms: blighten
glosses: To affect the fertility or growth of (a plant) with a blight (noun sense 1.1), especially one caused by a fungus; to blast, to mildew, to smut.
examples: text: [B]lighted be the tongue / That names thy name without the honour due!
ref: 1811, Walter Scott, The Vision of Don Roderick; a Poem, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for John Ballantyne and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC, stanza LI, page 47:
topics: medicine
pathology
sciences
glosses: To affect (a body part) with a disease.
examples: text: Those obscene tattoos are going to blight your job prospects.
text: [T]o be too far in loue vvith vvorldly felicity, that ſo blighteth goodneſſe and pietie, vvhat is it but vvith the Thurij to make an idoll of the vvinde, and to be in loue vvith blaſting.
ref: 1623, Iames Rowlandson [i.e., James Rowlandson], “The Second Sermon”, in Gods Blessing in Blasting, and His Mercy in Mildew. Two Sermons Sutable to These Times of Death, London: […] Iohn Haviland for William Bladen, […], →OCLC, page 44:
text: The lady Blast, you must understand, has such a particular malignity in her whisper, that it blights like an easterly wind, and withers every reputation that it breathes upon.
ref: 1712 August 25 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison], “THURSDAY, August 14, 1712”, in The Spectator, number 457; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume V, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 255:
text: Slavery, in all thy forms—mental and bodily—we detest thee! like the Upas-tree, thou blightest every thing within they poisonous influence; like the simoom, thou blastest all, wherever thy pestiferous breath reaches.
ref: 1840 June, “[Reviews of New Books, &c.] Art. III.—A History of Slavery and Its Abolition. By Esther Copley (a New Edit.) pp. 648. Houlston & Stoneman, Paternoster Row.”, in Robert Montgomery Martin, editor, The Colonial Magazine and Commercial-Maritime Journal, volume II, number 6, London; Liverpool: Fisher, Son, & Co., page 236:
text: Even he, cold and indifferent as he is, shall repent! I shall blight his hopes, as he has blighted mine.
ref: 1841, Catherine Sinclair, chapter IV, in Modern Flirtations; or, A Month at Harrowgate. […], volume III, Edinburgh: William Whyte and Co., […], →OCLC, page 78:
text: Then should we see depravity, impiety, drunkenness, theft, murder, and a long train of nameless sins against the natural affections and repulsions of mankind, overhanging the devoted spots, and creeping on, to blight the innocent and spread contagion among the pure.
ref: 1846 October 1 – 1848 April 1, Charles Dickens, “The Thunderbolt”, in Dombey and Son, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1848, →OCLC, page 459:
text: Bitter tears came now at the delusion which had blighted her young years: […]
ref: 1862 July – 1863 August, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], “Ariadne Discrowns Herself”, in Romola. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], published 1863, →OCLC, book II, page 194:
text: I need hardly explain to you that if you persist in this refusal you and I cannot continue to live together as man and wife. All my hopes and prospects in life will be blighted by such a separation.
ref: 1869 May, Anthony Trollope, “Lady Milborough as Ambassador”, in He Knew He Was Right, volume I, London: Strahan and Company, […], →OCLC, page 81:
text: And thus she would see him when she looked out upon the glad morning, and oh! would she drop one little tear upon his poor, lifeless form, would she heave one little sigh to see a bright young life so rudely blighted, so untimely cut down?
ref: 1876, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter III, in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Hartford, Conn.: The American Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 40:
text: Among the poorest of China’s provinces and autonomous regions, Gansu has largely been spared the overdevelopment that blights the country’s richer districts.
ref: 2020 May 11, Anna Sherman, “A Poetic Journey through Western China: Chapter 2: China: Xi’an to Turpan”, in T: The New York Times Style Magazine, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →OCLC, archived from the original on 07 Nov 2023:
text: Before the Internet it was television. And, if not that, it was radio, films, or games. All have taken their turn as the popular bogeyman, blighting the minds of the young.
ref: 2013, Frances Booth, The Distraction Trap: How to Focus in a Digital World, Harlow, Essex: Pearson, →ISBN:
synonyms: word: crab
word: ball up
word: blight
word: botch
word: bugger up
word: bungle
word: dirty
word: undo
word: disrupt
word: disturb
word: fuck up
word: jack up
word: mar
word: mess up
word: mishandle
word: mommick
word: pollute
word: put a crimp in
word: queer
word: ruin
word: screw up
word: sour
word: spoil
word: stain
word: upset
word: turn upside down
word: upset the applecart
word: vitiate
word: blighten
glosses: To impede the development or growth of (an aspect of life); to damage, to ruin, to spoil.
examples: text: This vine never blights.
glosses: Of a plant: to suffer blight (noun sense 1.1).
Derived terms: word: blighted
word: blighter
word: blighting
word: blightingly
word: unblight