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Dew
Definitions
- 1 A surname. countable, uncountable
- 2 An unincorporated community in Freestone County, Texas, United States. countable, uncountable
- 1 Any moisture from the atmosphere condensed by cool bodies upon their surfaces. uncountable
- 2 Acronym of Distant Early Warning. abbreviation, acronym, alt-of, uncountable
- 3 Initialism of directed-energy weapon. abbreviation, alt-of, initialism
- 4 water that has condensed on a cool surface overnight from water vapor in the air wordnet
- 5 Moisture in the air that settles on plants, etc in the morning or evening, resulting in drops. uncountable
"And Gideon said vnto God, If thou wilt saue Israel by mine hand, as thou hast said, Beholde, I will put a fleece of wooll in the floore: and if the deaw be on the fleece onely, and it bee drie vpon all the earth beside, then shall I know that thou wilt saue Israel by my hande, as thou hast said. And it was so: for he rose vp early on the morrow, and thrust the fleece together, and wringed the deaw out of the fleece, a bowle full of water. And Gideon said vnto God, Let not thine anger be hote against me, and I will speake but this once: Let mee prooue, I pray thee, but this once with the fleece. Let it now be drie onely vpon the fleece, and vpon all the ground let there be deaw. And God did so that night: for it was drie vpon the fleece onely, and there was deaw on all the ground."
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- 6 An instance of such moisture settling on plants, etc. countable
"There was a heavy dew this morning."
- 7 Anything that falls lightly and in a refreshing manner. countable, figuratively, uncountable
"the golden dew of sleep"
- 8 An emblem of morning, or fresh vigour. countable, figuratively, uncountable
"Thy people ſhalbe willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holineſſe from the wombe of the morning: thou haſt the dew of thy youth."
- 1 To wet with, or as if with, dew; to moisten. transitive
"The grasses grew / A little ranker since they dewed them so."
- 2 To deposit dew. intransitive
"The former [substances extremely attentuated, or in a filamentous and downly state] collect dew copiously, while the latter [solids] so rarely indicate its presence, even when it is dewing freely on contiguous substances, that some observers have doubted whether it ever happened, and have been disposed to believe that they repel it."
Etymology
From Middle English dew, from Old English dēaw (“dew”), from Proto-West Germanic *dauw, from Proto-Germanic *dawwaz, *dawwą (“dew, moisture”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰewh₂- (“smoke, haze”). Cognate with German Tau, Dutch dauw and Afrikaans dou. Doublet of dag.
From Middle English dewe, dewen, from Old English *dēawian, from Proto-West Germanic *dauwēn, from Proto-Germanic *dawwāną. Cognates include Saterland Frisian daue, German tauen and Dutch dauwen.
See also for "dew"
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