Abear
//əˈbɛə// noun, verb
noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 Bearing, behavior. obsolete
Verb
- 1 To put up with; to endure; to bear. archaic, dialectal, transitive
"Hunder-cook, indeed! which it's what I never abore yet, and never will abear."
- 2 To bear; to carry. obsolete, transitive
- 3 To behave; to comport oneself. obsolete, reflexive, transitive
"So did the Faerie knight himselfe abeare, / And stouped oft his head from shame to shield […]"
Example
More examples"Hunder-cook, indeed! which it's what I never abore yet, and never will abear."
Etymology
From Middle English aberen, from Old English āberan (“to bear, carry, carry away”), from ā- (“away, out”), a- + beran (“to bear”), from Proto-Germanic *uzberaną (“to bear off, bring forth, produce”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰer- (“to bear, carry”), equivalent to a- + bear. Cognate with Old High German irberan, Gothic 𐌿𐍃𐌱𐌰𐌹𐍂𐌰𐌽 (usbairan).
Related phrases
More for "abear"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.