freight
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: frāt
ipa: /fɹeɪt/
rhymes: -eɪt
Forms: form: freights
form: freighting
form: freighted
form: freighted
form: no-table-tags
form: glossary
form: freight
form: freight
form: freighted
form: freight
form: freightest
form: freighted
form: freightedst
form: freights
form: freighteth
form: freighted
form: freight
form: freighted
form: freight
form: freighted
form: freight
form: -
form: freighting
form: freighted
Etymology: The verb is derived from Late Middle English freighten, freghten, a variant of fraughten, fraghten (“to load (a ship with cargo or passengers); to hire (a ship) for transporting goods; to provide fully (with goods, money, etc.); to stow away”), and then either:
* from fraught, fraght (noun) (see etymology 1) + -en (suffix forming the infinitive form of verbs); or
* from Middle Dutch vrachten, vrechten (“to load (a ship with cargo or passengers); to hire (a ship) for transporting goods, to fraught”), from vracht, vrecht (noun) (see etymology 1) + -en (suffix forming the infinitive form of verbs).
The adjective is:
* derived from Middle English freght, freight, freyght, the past participle of fraughten (verb) (see above); and/or
* a contraction of freighted, the past participle of the verb.
Senses: examples: text: It is true, there be few Merchants, that with the Merchandiſe they buy at home, can fraight a Ship, to export it; or with that they buy abroad, to bring it home; and have therefore need to joyn together in one Society; […]
ref: 1651, Thomas Hobbes, “Of Systemes Subject, Politicall, and Private”, in Leviathan, or The Matter, Forme, & Power of a Common-wealth Ecclesiasticall and Civill, London: […] [William Wilson] for Andrew Crooke, […], →OCLC, 2nd part (Of Common-wealth), page 119:
text: If a Factor do receive a ſum of Mony of the owner of a Ship, in conſideration that he freighteth the ſaid Ship for a Voyage, promiſing to repay the ſaid Mony at the return of the ſaid Voyage; if the ſaid Factor hath freighted this Ship for another mans Account, this Merchant is to have the benefit of this Mony during the time; […]
ref: 1684, Abraham Liset, “Observations Concerning Factors”, in Amphithalami, or, The Accomptants Closet, Being an Abridgment of Merchants-accounts Kept by Debitors and Creditors; […] , London: […] Miles Flesher, for Robert Horne […], →OCLC, 2nd Part (Litera B), page 27:
text: [T]hey who freight their wealth upon a hundred vessels are more liable, Morton, are they not, to the peril of the winds and waves, than they who venture it only upon one?
ref: 1829, [Edward Bulwer-Lytton], “In which the Hero Shews Decision on More Points than One—More of Isora’s Character is Developed”, in Devereux. A Tale. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, book III, page 83:
text: Pearl, whose activity of spirit never flagged, had been at no loss for amusement while her mother talked with the old gatherer of herbs. At first, as already told, she had flirted fancifully with her own image in a pool of water, beckoning the phantom forth, and — as it declined to venture — seeking a passage for herself into its sphere of impalpable earth and unattainable sky. Soon finding, however, that either she or the image was unreal, she turned elsewhere for better pastime. She made little boats out of birch-bark, and freighted them with snail-shells, and sent out more ventures on the mighty deep than any merchant in New England ; but the larger part of them foundered near the shore.
ref: 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Hester and Pearl”, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC, page 215:
glosses: To load (a vehicle or vessel) with freight (cargo); also, to hire or rent out (a vehicle or vessel) to carry cargo or passengers.
glosses: To transport (goods).
examples: text: [W]hat though it is thou [i.e., sensibility] that rendereſt anguiſh more frequent, that filleſt the eye with the ſympathetic tear! yet is it not thou that ſwelleſt it with the tear of joy, and freighteſt the heart beyond the power of utterance,— […]
ref: 1783 October, Castalic [pseudonym], “The Essayist. Number XVI. Sensibility, a Rhapsody.”, in The Lady’s Magazine; or Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex. Appropriated Solely to Their Use and Amusement, volume XIV, London: […] G[eorge] Robinson, […], →OCLC, page 546, column 1:
text: Fortune freights not your channel with her hoarded stores, and Pleasure ventures not her silken sails upon your tide; […]
ref: 1829, [Edward Bulwer-Lytton], “A Change of Prospects—a New Insight into the Character of the Hero—a Conference between Two Brothers”, in Devereux. A Tale. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, book I, page 63:
text: Love, that fulfilleth his heart with glee,
 Love, that freighteth his breast with sighs,
 Love that must madden both you and me:— […]
ref: 1883 December, [Henry] Austin Dobson, “The Ballad of the Judgment of Paris”, in [W. H. Forman], editor, The Manhattan: An Illustrated Monthly Magazine, volume II, number VI, New York, N.Y.: The Manhattan Magazine Company, →OCLC, stanza 3, page 539:
glosses: To load or store (goods, etc.).
glosses: To carry (something) as if it is a burden or load.
examples: text: How often, when those hopes are greatest,
 The bark that bears them must not be
 Trusted with more than what thou freightest
 For sun-lit hour and summer sea:
 Who, when the waves are high and dark,
 Could steer, if freighted deep, such bark?
ref: 1840 March, F[rederick] W[illiam] Thomas, “A Poet to His Sister”, in The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, volume XV, number 3, New York, N.Y.: […] William Osborn, […], →OCLC, stanza 4, page 233:
text: Experience freightest for a better life.
 The folk that comes not with us have offended
 In that for which one Cæsar, triumphing,
 Heard himself called in contumely, 'Queen.'
ref: 1867, Dante Alighieri, “Canto XXVI”, in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, transl., The Divine Comedy, volume II (Purgatorio), Boston, Mass.: Ticknor and Fields, →OCLC, page 167, lines 75–78:
text: On their journeys those Britons were used to long fasts, and knew how to bear them; and also how to freight up against probable fasts before starting, after the style of the Indian and the anaconda.
ref: 1889, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], “Freemen!”, in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, New York, N.Y.: Charles L. Webster & Company, →OCLC, page 153:
glosses: Chiefly followed by up: to carry as part of a cargo.
Derived terms: word: afreight
word: freightage
word: freighted
word: freighter
word: freighting
Related terms: word: fraught