waxen

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English waxen, from Old English weaxen, ġeweaxen, from Proto-Germanic *wahsanaz, past participle of Proto-Germanic *wahsijaną (“to wax, grow, increase”), equivalent to wax +‎ -en (past participle ending).

Adjective

waxen (comparative more waxen, superlative most waxen)

1. (UK, dialectal) Grown.

Etymology 2

Verb

waxen

1. alternative past participle of wax.
2. (obsolete) plural simple present of wax
   • 1540, Great Bible, Second Edition, Preface

     And they that occupye them been in muche savegarde, and have greate consolacyon, and been the readyer unto all goodnesse, the slower to all evyll: and if they have done anything amysse, anone even by the sight of the bookes, theyr conscvences been admonished, and they waxen sory and ashamed of the facte.

   • 1579, Edmund Spenser, The Shepheardes Calender

     When the rayne is faln, the cloudes wexen cleare.

   • 1590-97, William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream, II, i

     And then the whole quire hold their hips and laugh,

     And waxen in their mirth and neeze and swear

     A merrier hour was never wasted there.

Etymology 3

From Middle English waxen, from Old English weaxen (“waxen, made of wax”), equivalent to wax +‎ -en (“made of”).

Adjective

waxen (comparative more waxen, superlative most waxen)

1. Made of wax; covered with wax.

   a waxen tablet

   • c. 1594 William Shakespeare, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act II, Scene 4,^[1]

     She is fair; and so is Julia that I love—

     That I did love, for now my love is thaw’d;

     Which, like a waxen image, ’gainst a fire,

     Bears no impression of the thing it was.

2. Of or pertaining to wax.
3. Having the pale smooth characteristics of wax, waxlike, waxy.
   • 1950, Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast, Penguin, 1969, Chapter 28, p. 185,^[2]

     It was hard to imagine that the broken thing had once been new; that those withered, waxen cheeks had been fresh and tinted. That her eyes had long ago glinted with laughter.

4. (rare) Easily effaced, as if written in wax.

Derived terms

• waxen chatterer
• waxen image

Translations

of or pertaining to wax

• Scottish Gaelic: cèireach
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}

having characteristics of wax

• Scottish Gaelic: cèireach
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}