wake
/ˈweɪ̯k/ verb, noun, proper noun
Forms wakes waking woke waked woken wakest wokest waketh
- verb (intransitive) (often followed by up) To stop sleeping. “I woke up at four o'clock this morning.”
- verb (transitive) (often followed by up) To make somebody stop sleeping; to rouse from sleep. “The neighbour's car alarm woke me from a strange dream.”
- verb (transitive, figurative) To put in motion or action; to arouse; to excite.
- verb (intransitive, figurative) To be excited or roused up; to be stirred up from a dormant, torpid, or inactive state; to be active.
- verb To watch, or sit up with, at night, as a dead body.
- verb To be or remain awake; not to sleep.
- verb (obsolete) To be alert; to keep watch “Command unto the guards that they diligently wake.”
- verb (obsolete) To sit up late for festive purposes; to hold a night revel.
- noun A period after a person's death before or after the body is buried, cremated, etc.; in some cultures accompanied by a party or collectively sorting through the deceased's personal effects.
- noun The state of forbearing sleep, especially for solemn or festive purposes; a vigil.
- noun (historical, Church of England) A yearly parish festival formerly held in commemoration of the dedication of a church. Originally, prayers were said on the evening preceding, and hymns were sung during the night, in the church; subsequently, these vigils were discontinued, and the day itself, often with succeeding days, was occupied in rural pastimes and exercises, attended by eating and drinking.
- noun (often obsolete or poetic) The act of waking, or state of being awake.
- noun (collective) A group of vultures or buzzards.
- noun (nautical) The path left behind a ship on the surface of the water.
- noun The disturbance which follows an object, person or animal moving through water.
- noun (aviation) The turbulent air left behind a flying aircraft.
- noun (figuratively) The area behind a moving person or object. “The player left the rest of the field trailing in her wake.”
- noun (physics) The perturbation behind a body moving through a fluid.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
get up stir awaken rouse arouse awake bring round cry knock up roust uprouse wake up waken abet actuate goose fuel light a fire under send sting aftermath backwash Wake Island viewing come alive inflame stir up ignite heat fire up
Antonyms
Etymology
A merger of two verbs of related/similar form and meaning:
* Middle English waken, Old English wacan, from Proto-West Germanic *wakan, from Proto-Germanic *wakaną.
* Middle English wakien, Old English wacian, from Proto-West Germanic *wakēn, from Proto-Germanic *wakāną.
From Middle English wake, from Old English wacu, from Proto-Germanic *wakō, related to the verb *wakjaną.
Probably from Middle Low German or Middle Dutch wake, from or akin to Old Norse vǫk (“a hole in the ice”) ( > Danish våge, Icelandic vök), from Proto-Germanic *wakwō (“wetness”), from Proto-Indo-European *wegʷ- (“moist, wet”).
English and Scottish surname from Old Norse vakr (“vigilant, wakeful”).
Webster’s 1913
- noun The track left by a vessel in the water; by extension, any track; as, the wake of an army.
- verb To be or to continue awake; to watch; not to sleep.
- verb To sit up late festive purposes; to hold a night revel.
- verb To rouse from sleep; to awake.
Etymology [Originally, an open space of water svök a hole, opening in ice, Sw. vak, Dan. vaage, perhaps akin to E. humid.]
Etymology [AS. wacan, wacian; akin to OFries. waka, OS. wak, D. waken, G. wachen, OHG. wahh, Icel. vaka, Sw. vaken, Dan. vaage, Goth. wakan, v. i., uswakjan, v. t., Skr. vajay to rouse, to impel. Vigil, Wait, v. i., Watch, v. i.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “wake”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details