drown
verb
cover completely or make imperceptible
- “I was drowned in work”
- “The noise drowned out her speech”
die from being submerged in water, getting water into the lungs, and asphyxiating
- “The child drowned in the lake”
Origin
From Middle English drownen, drounen, drunen (“to drown”), of obscure and uncertain origin. The OED suggests an unattested Old English form *drūnian. Harper 2001 points to Old English druncnian, ġedruncnian (> Middle English drunknen, dronknen (“to drown”)), "probably influenced" by Old Norse drukkna (cf. Icelandic drukkna, Danish drukne (“to drown”)). Funk & Wagnall's has 'of uncertain origin'. It has been theorised (see e.g. ODS) that it may represent a direct loan of Old Norse drukkna, but this is described by the OED as being "on phonetic and other grounds [...] highly improbable", unless one considers the possibility of an unattested variant in Old Norse *drunkna.
Phrases
- a drowning man will clutch at a straw
- a drowning man will grab at a straw
- a drowning man will grab at straws
- a drowning man will grasp at a straw
- a drowning man will grasp at straws
- drown one's sorrows
- drown out
- drowned tube
Related words
See also
WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.