blood
/blʌd/ noun, verb, proper noun
Forms bloods blooding blooded bloud bloode bl00d
- noun A vital liquid flowing in the bodies of many types of animals that usually conveys nutrients and oxygen. In vertebrates, it is colored red by hemoglobin, is conveyed by arteries and veins, is pumped by the heart and is usually generated in bone marrow. “Some insects are known for consuming blood.”
- noun A family relationship due to birth, such as that between siblings; contrasted with relationships due to marriage or adoption. See blood relative, blood relation.
- noun (uncountable) A person or people related to one by birth; one's biological relative or relatives. “She may not be my blood, but we grew up together, and as far as I'm concerned she's my sister.”
- noun (historical) One of the four humours in the human body.
- noun The endometrial lining as it is shed in menstruation; menstrual fluid or period blood.
- noun (medicine, informal, countable) A blood test or blood sample.
- noun The sap or juice which flows in or from plants.
- noun (poetic) The juice of anything, especially if red.
- verb (transitive) To cause something to be covered with blood; to bloody.
- verb (medicine, historical) To let blood (from); to bleed.
- verb (transitive) To initiate into warfare or a blood sport, traditionally by smearing with the blood of the first kill witnessed.
- verb (transitive, obsolete) To make eager for bloodshed or combat; to incite or enrage against.
- noun A member of the Los Angeles gang the Bloods, who typically wear red and have an intense and bitter rivalry with the Crips.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
background descent heritage stock fop popinjay barbermonger beau blade buck carpet knight cockscomb dandy dike dood dude dudelet exquisite fashionable fast man rake rakehell profligate rip roue lineage line line of descent bloodline blood line
Etymology
From Middle English blood, from Old English blōd, from Proto-West Germanic *blōd, from Proto-Germanic *blōþą, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰel- ("to swell") + -ó- (thematic vowel) + -to (nominalizer), i.e. "that which bursts out".
Cognate with Scots blude, bluid (“blood”), North Frisian blud, blödj, Blör (“blood”), Saterland Frisian Bloud (“blood”), West Frisian bloed (“blood”), Cimbrian pluat, pluut (“blood”), Dutch bloed (“blood”), German Blut (“blood”), German Low German Blood, Bloot (“blood”), Luxembourgish Blutt (“blood”), Vilamovian błüt (“blood”), Yiddish בלוט (blut, “blood”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish blod (“blood”), Faroese and Icelandic blóð (“blood”), Crimean Gothic plut (“blood”), Gothic 𐌱𐌻𐍉𐌸 (blōþ, “blood”).
When the gang was formed, the term blood, from blood brother, was common street slang, used in the 1960s by young Black and Hispanic men and returning veterans from the Vietnam War to refer to friends.
Webster’s 1913
- noun The fluid which circulates in the principal vascular system of animals, carrying nourishment to all parts of the body, and bringing away waste products to be excreted. See under Arterial.
- noun Relationship by descent from a common ancestor; consanguinity; kinship.
- verb To bleed. [Obs.] Cowper.
- verb To stain, smear or wet, with blood. [Archaic]
Etymology [OE. blod, blood, AS. bl; akin to D. bloed, OHG. bluot, G. blut, Goth, bl, Sw. & Dan. blod; prob. fr. the same root as E. blow to bloom. See Blow to bloom.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “blood”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details