wen

See also Wen, wên, wēn, wén, wěn, and wèn

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: wĕn, IPA: /wɛn/, X-SAMPA: /wEn/
• Rhymes: -ɛn
• Homophone: when (in accents with the wine-whine merger)

Etymology 1

From Old English wenn

Noun

wen (plural wens)

1. a cyst on the skin
   • 1854, Henry David Thoreau, Walden, Walden

     When I have met an immigrant tottering under a bundle which contained his all--looking like an enormous wen which had grown out of the nape of his neck--I have pitied him, not because that was his all, but because he had all that to carry.

   • 1973, Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow

     Creeps, foreigners with tinted, oily skin, wens, sties, cysts, wheezes, bad teeth, limps, staring or—worse—with Strange Faraway Smiles.

Translations

a cyst on the skin

• Finnish: rakkula (fi), rakko (fi), kysta (fi)
• French: loupe (fr) f

• Korean: 혹 (hog, hok)
• Russian: жировик (ru) (žirovík) m

Etymology 2

From Old English wynn

Noun

wen (plural wens)

1. a runic letter later replaced by w

Anagrams

• new, New

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Dutch

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɛn

Etymology 1

From Proto-Germanic *hwannē. Cognate with English when, German wann.

Adverb

wen

1. (archaic) when

   En ik dacht aan den geur harer bloesems, aan het huiveren harer takken, aan den zang harer vogelen; en ik vroeg mij: wen rieken wij die? (V. Someren, 1822)

   And I thought about the scent of her blossoms, at the shuddering of her branches, at the songs of her birds, and I asked myself: when do we smell these?

Conjunction

wen

1. (archaic) when

   Daar heb ik wen de vogels vlogen, heimelik in elk nest geschouwd! (L. De Mont, 1880)

   There have I, when the birds flew, looked privily in each nest!

Etymology 2

Verb

wen

1. first-person singular present indicative of wennen
2. imperative of wennen

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Elfdalian

Pronoun

wen

1. what

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German

Pronunciation

• IPA: [veːn]
• Rhymes: -eːn

Pronoun

wen

1. (interrogative) accusative of wer, who(m) (direct object).

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Gothic

Romanization

wēn

1. See 𐍅𐌴𐌽

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Mandarin

Romanization

wen

1. Nonstandard spelling of wēn.
2. Nonstandard spelling of wén.
3. Nonstandard spelling of wěn.
4. Nonstandard spelling of wèn.

Usage notes

English transcriptions of Chinese speech often fail to distinguish between the critical tonal differences employed in the Chinese language, using words such as this one without the appropriate indication of tone.

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Old English

Etymology

Proto-Germanic *wēniz, from Proto-Indo-European *wen- (“love”). Cognate with Old Frisian wen, Old Saxon wan, Old High German wān (German Wahn ‘delusion’), Old Norse ván, Gothic 𐍅𐌴𐌽𐍃.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /weːn/

Noun

wēn f

1. hope, belief
2. expectation, likelihood

Declension

    Declension of wen (strong ō-stem)

	Singular	Plural
nominative	wēn	wēna, wēne
accusative	wēne	wēna, wēne
genitive	wēne	wēna
dative	wēne	wēnum

Descendants

• English: ween