cloud
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: kloud
ipa: /klaʊd/
rhymes: -aʊd
Forms: form: clouds
form: clouding
form: clouded
form: clouded
form: cloude
form: clowd
Etymology: From Middle English cloud, from Old English clūd (“mass of stone, rock, boulder, hill”), from Proto-West Germanic *klūt, from Proto-Germanic *klūtaz, *klutaz (“lump, mass, conglomeration”), from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to ball up, clench”).
Cognate with Scots clood, clud (“cloud”), Dutch kluit (“lump, mass, clod”), German Low German Kluut, Kluute (“lump, mass, ball”), German Kloß (“lump, ball, dumpling”), Danish klode (“sphere, orb, planet”), Swedish klot (“sphere, orb, ball, globe”), Icelandic klót (“knob on a sword's hilt”). Related to English clod, clot, clump, club. Largely replaced Middle English wolken, from Old English wolcn (whence Modern English welkin), the commonest Germanic word (compare Dutch wolk, German Wolke).
Senses: examples: text: The glass clouds when you breathe on it.
glosses: To become foggy or gloomy, or obscured from sight.
examples: text: The sky is clouded.
glosses: To overspread or hide with a cloud or clouds.
examples: text: The horses stamping
Their warm breath clouding
In the sharp and frosty morning
Of the day.
ref: 1972, “Thick As A Brick”, Ian Anderson (lyrics), performed by Jethro Tull:
glosses: Of the breath, to become cloud; to turn into mist.
examples: text: All this talk about human rights is clouding the real issue.
glosses: To make obscure.
examples: text: Your emotions are clouding your judgement.
text: The tears began to well up and cloud my vision.
glosses: To make less acute or perceptive.
examples: text: One day too late, I fear me, noble lord,
 Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth.
ref: 1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:
text: Be not disheartened, then, nor cloud those looks.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book V”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
glosses: To make gloomy or sullen.
examples: text: I would not be a stander-by to hear
 My sovereign mistress clouded so, without
 My present vengeance taken.
ref: c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:
glosses: To blacken; to sully; to stain; to tarnish (reputation or character).
examples: text: to cloud yarn
text: The nice conduct of a clouded cane
ref: 1714, Alexander Pope, “The Rape of the Lock”, in The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope, volume I, London: […] W[illiam] Bowyer, for Bernard Lintot, […], published 1717, →OCLC, canto IV:
glosses: To mark with, or darken in, veins or sports; to variegate with colors.
glosses: To become marked, darkened or variegated in this way.