Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

wile

/waɪl/ noun, verb, proper noun

Forms wiles wiling wiled

  1. noun (usually in the plural) A trick or stratagem practiced for ensnaring or deception; a sly, insidious artifice “He was seduced by her wiles.”
  2. verb (transitive) To entice or lure.
  3. proper noun A surname transferred from the nickname.
  4. proper noun (rare) A male given name transferred from the surname.

Synonyms

beguilement allurement trickery chicanery chicane guile shenanigan

Etymology

From Middle English wile, wyle, from Old Northern French wile (“guile”) and Old English wīl (“wile, trick”) and wiġle (“divination”), from Proto-Germanic *wīlą (“craft, deceit”) (from Proto-Indo-European *wey- (“to turn, bend”)) and Proto-Germanic *wigulą, *wihulą (“prophecy”) (from Proto-Indo-European *weyk- (“to consecrate, hallow, make holy”)). Cognate with Icelandic vél, væl (“artifice, craft, device, fraud, trick”), Dutch wijle. Doublet of guile.

The phrase meaning to pass time idly is while away. We can trace the meaning in an adjectival sense for while back to Old English, hwīlen, "passing, transitory". It is also seen in whilend, "temporary, transitory". But since wile away occurs so often, it is now included in many dictionaries.

From Middle English wile, an occupational surname for a trapper or a nickname for a wily person.

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A trick or stratagem practiced for insnaring or deception; a sly, insidious; artifice; a beguilement; an allurement.
  2. verb To practice artifice upon; to deceive; to beguile; to allure. [R.]
  3. verb To draw or turn away, as by diversion; to while or while away; to cause to pass pleasantly. Tennyson.

Etymology [OE. wile, AS. wil; cf. Icel. v, væl. Cf. Guile.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “wile”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details