delay
/dɪˈleɪ/ noun, verb, proper noun
Forms delays delaying delayed
- noun A period of time before an event occurs; the act of delaying; procrastination; lingering inactivity. “the delay before the echo of a sound”
- noun (music) An audio effects unit that introduces a controlled delay.
- noun (programming, Clojure) Synonym of promise (“object representing delayed result”).
- noun (chess) An amount of time provided on each move before one's clock starts to tick; a less common time control than increment.
- verb To put off until a later time; to defer.
- verb To retard; to temporarily stop, detain, or hinder. “The mail is delayed by a heavy fall of snow.”
- verb (intransitive) To wait, hesitate, tarry. “Don't delay; this special offer ends at midnight!”
- verb (transitive, obsolete) To allay; to temper.
- verb (obsolete) To dilute, temper.
- verb (obsolete) To assuage, quench, allay.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
cunctation promise hold-up deferment dilation detain hinder hesitance hesitancy hesitation holdoff postponement prorogation respite retard adjourn defer forslow penelopize postpone hold time lag wait holdup hold up stay check
Antonyms
Etymology
From Middle English delaien, borrowed from Anglo-Norman delaier, Old French deslaier, from des- + Old French laier (“to leave”), a conflation of Old Frankish *lattjan ("to delay, hinder"; from Proto-Germanic *latjaną (“to delay, hinder, stall”), from Proto-Indo-European *leh₁d- (“to leave, leave behind”)), and Old Frankish *laibijan ("to leave"; from Proto-Germanic *laibijaną (“to leave, cause to stay”), from Proto-Indo-European *leyp- (“to remain, continue”)). Doublet of dally.
Akin to Old English latian (“to delay, hesitate”), Old English latu (“a delay, a hindrance”), Old English lǣfan (“to leave”). More at let (to hinder), late, leave.
From Middle English delaien, from Old French delaiier, a variant of delaissier.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A putting off or deferring; procrastination; lingering inactivity; stop; detention; hindrance.
- verb To put off; to defer; to procrastinate; to prolong the time of or before.
- verb To retard; to stop, detain, or hinder, for a time; to retard the motion, or time of arrival, of; as, the mail is delayed by a heavy fall of snow.
- verb To move slowly; to stop for a time; to linger; to tarry.
Etymology [F. délai, fr. OF. deleer to delay, or fr. L. dilatum, which, though really from a different root, is used in Latin only as a p. p. neut. of differre to carry apart, defer, delay. See Tolerate, and cf. Differ, Delay, v.]
Etymology [OF. deleer, delaier, fr. the noun délai, or directly fr. L. dilatare to enlarge, dilate, in LL., to put off. See Delay, n., and cf. Delate, 1st Defer, Dilate.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “delay”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details