seek
/ˈsiːk/ verb, noun, proper noun
Also a form of Sikh
Forms seeks seeking sought seeked seekest soughtest seeketh seech seeke
- verb (ambitransitive) To try to find; to look for; to search for. “I seek wisdom.”
- verb (transitive) To try to acquire or gain; to strive after. “I sought my fortune on the goldfields.”
- verb (transitive) To try to reach or come to (a location). “When the alarm went off I sought the exit in a panic.”
- verb (intransitive) To attempt, to try [with infinitive ‘to do something’]. “Our company does not seek to limit its employees from using the internet or engaging in social networking.”
- verb (transitive) To ask for; to solicit. “I seek forgiveness through repentance.”
- verb (intransitive, obsolete) To go, to move, to travel (in a given direction).
- verb (intransitive, computing) To move to a specified location (particularly of a disk drive or similar device). “This function instructs the hard drive to seek to a specified track.”
- verb (intransitive, computing) To navigate through a data stream.
- noun (computing) The operation of navigating through a stream.
- proper noun A surname from German.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English seke, seken, from Old English sēċan, sēċean, sœ̄ċan, from Proto-West Germanic *sōkijan, from Proto-Germanic *sōkijaną (“to seek”), from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂gyeti (“to seek out”), from *seh₂g- (“to follow, trace”).
Cognate with Yola zeek (“to seek”), North Frisian schük, sjuk, säke (“to search, seek”), Saterland Frisian säike (“to search, seek”), West Frisian sykje (“to seek”), Alemannic German sueche, süeche (“to search, seek”), Bavarian suacha, suachn (“to search”), Central Franconian söke (“to search”), Cimbrian züuchan (“to seek”), Dutch zoeken (“to seek”), Low German söken (“to seek”), German suchen (“to seek”), Luxembourgish sichen (“to seek; to fetch”), Vilamovian zihia, zihja (“to seek”), Yiddish זוכן (zukhn, “to search, seek”), Danish søge (“to seek; to apply”), Faroese søkja (“to seek”), Icelandic sækja (“to seek”), Norwegian Bokmål søke (“to seek; to apply”), Norwegian Nynorsk søka, søke, søkja, søkje (“to seek; to apply”), Swedish söka (“to search”), Gothic 𐍃𐍉𐌺𐌾𐌰𐌽 (sōkjan, “to seek”); also Cornish hedhes (“to reach; to achieve; to manage”), Welsh haeddu (“to deserve, merit”), Latin sāgiō (“to perceive quickly or keenly with the senses”), Ancient Greek ἡγέομαι (hēgéomai, “to go before, precede; to lead; to believe, hold”), Albanian gjegj (“to answer; to obey”), Hittite 𒊭𒀀𒆠𒄑𒍣 (ša-a-ki-ez-zi, “to seek out”).
The Middle English and later Modern English hard /k/ derives from Old English sēcð, the third person singular.
* As a North/Low German surname, from Seek, variant of Seeck, shortened from compound names containing the element Sieg (“victory”) (as in Siegfried) or siech (“ill”).
* As a Chinese surname, Romanized from 薛 (xuē), see Xue.
Webster’s 1913
- adjective Sick. [Obs.] Chaucer.
- verb To go in search of; to look for; to search for; to try to find.
- verb To inquire for; to ask for; to solicit; to bessech.
- verb To make search or inquiry: to endeavor to make discovery.
Etymology [OE, seken, AS. s, s; akin to OS. s, LG. söken, D. zoeken, OHG. suohhan, G. suchen, Icel. s, Sw. söka, Dan. söge, Goth. s, and E. sake. Cf. Beseech, Ransack, Sagacious, Sake, Soc.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “seek”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details