Word: spring Part of Speech: verb Etymology: From Middle English springen, from Old English springan (“to spring, leap, bounce, sprout forth, emerge, spread out”), from Proto-West Germanic *springan, from Proto-Germanic *springaną (“to burst forth”), from Proto-Indo-European *spre(n)ǵʰ- (“to move, race, spring”), from *sperǵʰ- (“to hurry”). Cognates * Saterland Frisian springe * West Frisian springe * Dutch springen * German Low German springen * German springen * Danish springe * Swedish springa * Norwegian springe * Faroese springa * Icelandic springa (“to burst, explode”). Other possible cognates include Lithuanian spreñgti (“to push (in)”), Old Church Slavonic прѧсти (pręsti, “to spin, to stretch”), Latin spargere (“to sprinkle, to scatter”), Ancient Greek σπέρχω (spérkhō, “to hasten”), Sanskrit स्पृहयति (spṛháyati, “to be eager”). Some newer senses derived from the noun. Pronunciation: /ˈspɹɪŋ/, [ˈspɹʷɪŋ], /ˈspɹiŋ/, [ˈspɹʷiŋ], /ˈspɹɪ̝ŋ/ 1. To move or burst forth. Labels: intransitive Example: The boat sprang a leak and began to sink. Example: ...þe wound þat was springand with huge stremes of blude... 2. To move or burst forth. Labels: intransitive Example: ...so the man tooke his concubine, and brought her foorth vnto them, and they knew her, and abused her all the night vntil the morning: and when the day began to spring, they let her goe. Example: Home I would go, But that my Dores are hatefull to my eyes. Fill'd and damm'd up with gaping Creditors, Watchfull as Fowlers when their Game will ſpring; […] 3. To move or burst forth. Labels: intransitive Example: Who hath diuided a water-course for the ouerflowing of waters? or a way for the lightning of thunder, To cause it to raine on the earth, where no man is: on the wildernesse wherein there is no man? To satisfie the desolate and waste ground, and to cause the bud of the tender herbe to spring forth. Example: Commerce! beneath whose poison-breathing shade No solitary virtue dares to spring, […] 4. To move or burst forth. Labels: UK, dialectal, intransitive 5. To move or burst forth. Labels: figuratively, intransitive 6. To move or burst forth. Labels: figuratively, intransitive, sometimes Example: He hit the gas and the car sprang to life. 7. To move or burst forth. Labels: figuratively, intransitive, usually Example: Deer spring with their hind legs, using their front hooves to steady themselves. Example: ...into helle spring... 8. To move or burst forth. Labels: intransitive, usually Example: He sprang from peasant stock. Example: From this basis, a first-order difference equation for the evolution of capital per worker is found, and the time path of the economy springs from this equation. 9. To move or burst forth. Labels: intransitive, obsolete 10. To cause to spring (all senses). Labels: transitive 11. To cause to spring (all senses). Labels: transitive Example: He sprang the trap. Example: They sprung another Mine... wherein was placed about sixtie Barrels of Powder. 12. To leap over. Labels: transitive Example: I sprang the fence, and was soon in the village street. 13. To breed with, to impregnate. Labels: obsolete Example: ...[they] sought the fairest stoned horses to spring their mares... 14. To wet, to moisten. Labels: obsolete, transitive 15. To burst into pieces, to explode, to shatter. Labels: intransitive, usually Example: On the 22nd the mines sprang, and took very good effect. 16. To go off. Labels: obsolete Example: The whole contraption appears liable to spring apart at any moment. 17. To crack. Labels: ambitransitive, perfective, usually Example: The Edward sprang hir foremast. 18. To come upon and flush out. Example: For generations of men the springer spaniel has been looked upon as the dog for springing pheasants in covert and finding and retrieving dead birds or winged runners when ordered to do so. The properly broken dog will not chase, but drop to wing and shot. Example: […] by the beginning of this century a still smaller breed, with a weight of 4 of 5 pounds and a chest measurement of around 12 inches, had come into being for springing rabbits. Such, then, is a rough, quick ancestral picture of our modern Dachshund, and[…] 19. To catch in an illegal act or compromising position. Labels: Australia, slang Example: He figured that nobody would ever spring him, but he figured wrong. 20. To begin. Labels: obsolete 21. To put bad money into circulation. Labels: obsolete, slang 22. To tell, to share. Example: Sorry to spring it on you like this but I've been offered another job. Example: North Korea loves to spring surprises. More unusual is for its US foe to play along. 23. To free from imprisonment, especially by facilitating an illegal escape. Labels: US, slang, transitive Example: His lieutenants hired a team of miners to help spring him. Example: If I was in jail I know you'd spring me 24. To be free of imprisonment, especially by illegal escape. Labels: intransitive, rare, slang 25. To secure a person's release from custody; to free or bail out of jail. Example: The Big Man, of course, had had an alibi as solid as Fort Knox. He had been held and questioned, but was quickly sprung by the best lawyer in Harlem. 26. To build, to form the initial curve of. Labels: transitive Example: They sprung an arch over the lintel. 27. To extend, to curve. Labels: intransitive Example: The arches spring from the front posts. 28. To turn a vessel using a spring attached to its anchor cable. Labels: transitive 29. To pay or spend a certain sum, to yield. Labels: transitive Example: He wouldn't spring a nickel for a bag of peanuts. 30. To raise an offered price. Labels: intransitive, obsolete, slang 31. Alternative form of sprain. Labels: US, alt-of, alternative, dialectal, transitive 32. Alternative form of strain. Labels: US, alt-of, alternative, dialectal, transitive 33. To act as a spring: to strongly rebound. Labels: intransitive, obsolete 34. To equip with springs, especially (of vehicles) to equip with a suspension. Labels: rare, transitive 35. to inspire, to motivate. Labels: figuratively, obsolete, rare 36. To deform owing to excessive pressure, to become warped; to intentionally deform in order to position and then straighten in place. Labels: ambitransitive Example: Don't drive it in too hard, as it will ‘spring’ the plane-iron, and make it concave. Example: A piece of timber sometimes springs in seasoning. 37. To swell with milk or pregnancy. Labels: UK, dialectal, intransitive Example: “Gee, Dad, Nancy’s springing all right,” Ray said and paused in spontaneous pleasure. Stan Parker came, and together they looked at their swelling heifer. 38. To sound, to play. Labels: archaic, transitive Example: I do not know how John and his mistress would have settled the fate of the thief, but just at this moment a policeman entered — for the cook had sprung the rattle, and had been screaming "Murder" and "Thieves." 39. To find or get enough food during springtime.