wane
/weɪn/ noun, verb
Forms wanes waning waned wain waine wean wone
- noun A gradual diminution in power, value, intensity etc.
- noun The lunar phase during which the sun seems to illuminate less of the moon as its sunlit area becomes progressively smaller as visible from Earth.
- noun (literary) The end of a period.
- noun (woodworking) A rounded corner caused by lack of wood, often showing bark.
- verb (intransitive) To progressively lose its splendor, value, ardor, power, intensity etc.; to decline.
- verb (intransitive) For light to dim or diminish in strength.
- verb (intransitive, astronomy) For the Moon to pass through the phases of its monthly cycle where its surface is less and less visible.
- verb (intransitive) Said of a time period that comes to an end.
- verb (intransitive, archaic) To decrease physically in size, amount, numbers or surface.
- verb (transitive, obsolete) To cause to decrease.
- noun (Scotland, slang) A child.
- noun (chiefly Northern England and Scotland, obsolete) A house or dwelling.
Synonyms
Antonyms
Etymology
From Middle English wane, from Old English wana (“defect, shortage”), from Proto-West Germanic *wanō, from Proto-Germanic *wanô, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weh₂- (“to leave, abandon; empty, deserted”).
See also wan-, want, and waste. Compare also Dutch waan (“insanity”) and German Wahn (“insanity”) deprecated defect, Old Norse vanr (“lacking”) ( > Danish prefix van-, only found in compounds), Latin vanus, Gothic 𐍅𐌰𐌽𐍃 (wans, “missing, lacking”), Albanian vonë (“late, futile, mentally retarded”), Armenian ունայն (unayn, “empty”), Old Saxon and Old High German wanon (“to decrease”), Modern Dutch weinig (“a few”), Modern German weniger (“less”), comparative of wenig (“few”) (-ig being a derivate suffix; -er the suffix of comparatives). Doublet of vain, vaunt, vaniloquent, vast, vacuum, vacant, vacate, which are Latin-derived, via the PIE root.
From Middle English wanen, wanien, from Old English wanian, wonian, from Proto-West Germanic *wanōn, from Proto-Germanic *wanōną.
From Scots wean.
From Middle English wōne, wāne (“dwelling," "custom”), of unclear origins, compare wont.
Webster’s 1913
- verb To be diminished; to decrease; --contrasted with wax, and especially applied to the illuminated part of the moon.
- verb To decline; to fail; to sink.
- verb To cause to decrease. [Obs.] B. Jonson.
- noun The decrease of the illuminated part of the moon to the eye of a spectator.
Etymology [OE. wanien, AS. wanian, wonian, from wan, won, deficient, wanting; akin to D. wan-, G. wahnsinn, insanity, OHG. wan, wana-, lacking, wan to lessen, Icel. vanr lacking, Goth. vans; cf. Gr. wanting, inferior. Want lack, and Wanton.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “wane”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details