weigh

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Middle English weghen, weȝen, from Old English wegan, from Proto-Germanic *weganą (“to move, carry, weigh”), from Proto-Indo-European *wéǵʰeti, from *weǵʰ- (“to bring, transport”). Cognate with Scots wey or weich, Dutch wegen, German wiegen, wägen, Danish veje, Norwegian Bokmål veie, Norwegian Nynorsk vega. Doublet of wedge, wagon, way, and vector.

Pronunciation[edit]

  • enPR: wā, IPA(key): /weɪ/
  • Audio (US)
    		(file)

Rhymes: -eɪ

Verb[edit]

weigh (third-person singular simple present weighs, present participle weighing, simple past and past participle weighed)

  1. (transitive) To determine the weight of an object.
  2. (transitive) Often with "out", to measure a certain amount of something by its weight, e.g. for sale.
    He weighed out two kilos of oranges for a client.
  3. (transitive, figuratively) To determine the intrinsic value or merit of an object, to evaluate.
    You have been weighed in the balance and found wanting.
    • 2011, Roy F. Baumeister, John Tierney, Willpower, →ISBN, page 103:
      As they started picking features, customers would carefully weigh the choices, but as decision fatigue set in they'd start settling for whatever the default option was.
  4. (intransitive, figuratively, obsolete) To judge; to estimate.
    • (Can we date this quote by Spenser and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      could not weigh of worthiness aright
  5. (transitive) To consider a subject. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
  6. (transitive) To have a certain weight.
    I weigh ten and a half stone.
  7. (intransitive) To have weight; to be heavy; to press down.
    • (Can we date this quote by Cowper and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      They only weigh the heavier.
    • (Can we date this quote by Shakespeare and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      Cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff / Which weighs upon the heart.
  8. (intransitive) To be considered as important; to have weight in the intellectual balance.
    • (Can we date this quote by Shakespeare and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      Your vows to her and me […] will even weigh.
    • (Can we date this quote by John Locke and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      This objection ought to weigh with those whose reading is designed for much talk and little knowledge.
  9. (transitive, nautical) To raise an anchor free of the seabed.
  10. (intransitive, nautical) To weigh anchor.
    • 1624, John Smith, Generall Historie, in Kupperman 1988, p. 91:
      Towards the evening we wayed, and approaching the shoare [...], we landed where there lay a many of baskets and much bloud, but saw not a Salvage.
    • 1841, Edgar Allan Poe, ‘A Descent into the Maelström’:
      ‘Here we used to remain until nearly time for slack-water again, when we weighed and made for home.’
  11. To bear up; to raise; to lift into the air; to swing up.
    • (Can we date this quote by Cowper and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      Weigh the vessel up.
  12. (obsolete) To consider as worthy of notice; to regard.
    • (Can we date this quote by Shakespeare and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      I weigh not you.
    • (Can we date this quote by Spenser and provide title, author's full name, and other details?)
      all that she so dear did weigh

Derived terms[edit]

Related terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

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