wind
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: wĭnd
ipa: /wɪnd/
enpr: wīnd
ipa: /waɪnd/
rhymes: -ɪnd
homophone: winned
enpr: wīnd
ipa: /waɪnd/
rhymes: -aɪnd
homophone: wined
homophone: whined (wine–whine merger)
enpr: wĭnd
ipa: /wɪnd/
enpr: wīnd
ipa: /waɪnd/
rhymes: -ɪnd
homophone: winned
Forms: form: winds
form: winding
form: wound
form: wound
form: winded
form: winded
Etymology: From Middle English wynden, 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.
Senses: examples: text: to wind thread on a spool or into a ball
text: Whether to wind / The woodbine round this arbour.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, 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:
text: 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.
ref: 1906, Stanley J[ohn] Weyman, chapter I, in Chippinge Borough, New York, N.Y.: McClure, Phillips & Co., →OCLC:
glosses: To turn coils of (a cord or something similar) around something.
examples: text: Please wind that old-fashioned alarm clock.
glosses: To tighten the spring of a clockwork mechanism.
examples: text: Sleep, and I will wind thee in arms.
ref: c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, 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 IV, scene i]:
glosses: To entwist; to enfold; to encircle.
examples: text: Vines wind round a pole.  The river winds through the plain.
text: He therefore turned him to the steep and rocky path which[…]winded through the thickets of wild boxwood and other low aromatic shrubs.
ref: 1829 May 2, [Walter Scott], Anne of Geierstein; or, The Maiden of the Mist. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] [Ballantyne and Company] for Cadell and Co., […]; London: Simpkin and Marshall, […], →OCLC:
text: The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea.
ref: 1750 June 12 (date written; published 1751), T[homas] Gray, “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”, in Designs by Mr. R[ichard] Bentley, for Six Poems by Mr. T. Gray, London: […] R[obert] Dodsley, […], published 1753, →OCLC:
text: 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.
ref: 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
text: The long and winding road / That leads to your door / Will never disappear.
ref: 1969, Paul McCartney, The Long and Winding Road:
glosses: To travel or follow a path with numerous curves.
examples: text: to turn and wind a fiery Pegasus
ref: 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:
text: Gifts blind the vviſe, and bribes do pleaſe, / And vvinde all other witneſſes: […]
ref: 1648, Robert Herrick, “To his Conscience.”, in Hesperides: Or, The Works both Humane & Divine […], London: […] John Williams, and Francis Eglesfield, and are to be sold by Tho[mas] Hunt, […], →OCLC:
text: Were our legislature vested in the person of our prince, he might doubtless wind and turn our constitution at his pleasure.
ref: 12 October 1710, Joseph Addison, The Examiner No. 5
glosses: To have complete control over; to turn and bend at one's pleasure; to vary or alter at will; to regulate; to govern.
examples: text: You have contrived[…]to wind / Yourself into a power tyrannical.
ref: c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iii]:
text: 'Tis pleasant to see what little arts and dexterities they have to wind in such things into discourse
ref: 1674, [Richard Allestree], The Government of the Tongue. […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: At the Theater, →OCLC:
glosses: To introduce by insinuation; to insinuate.
examples: text: to wind a rope with twine
glosses: To cover or surround with something coiled about.
examples: text: Quickly she slammed the door shut and panicking wound the window up as fast as her slippery fingers would allow.
ref: 2012, Rural Affairs, Anna Hutton-North, Lulu.com, →ISBN, page 33:
glosses: To cause to move by exerting a winding force; to haul or hoist as by a winch.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To turn (a ship) around, end for end.
Derived terms: word: bewind
word: rewind
word: self-winding
word: underwind
word: unwind
word: windable
word: wind around one's little finger
word: wind back
word: wind back the clock
word: wind down
word: winder
word: winding
word: windlass
word: wind off
word: wind one's neck in
word: wind somebody round one's finger
word: wind-up
word: wind up
Related terms: unwind
wend