different between deluge vs drown

English

Etymology

From Middle English deluge, from Old French deluge, alteration of earlier deluvie, from Latin d?luvium, from d?lu? (“wash away”). Doublet of diluvium.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?d?l.ju?d?/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?d?l.ju(d)?/, /d??lu(d)?/

Noun

deluge (plural deluges)

1. A great flood or rain.

   The deluge continued for hours, drenching the land and slowing traffic to a halt.

2. An overwhelming amount of something; anything that overwhelms or causes great destruction.

   The rock concert was a deluge of sound.

   • 1848, James Russell Lowell, The Vision of Sir Launfal

     The little bird sits at his door in the sun, / Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, / And lets his illumined being o'errun / With the deluge of summer it receives.

3. (military engineering) A damage control system on navy warships which is activated by excessive temperature within the Vertical Launching System.
   • 2002, NAVEDTRA, Gunner's Mate 14324A

     In the event of a restrained firing or canister overtemperature condition, the deluge system sprays cooling water within the canister until the overtemperature condition no longer exists.

Translations

Verb

deluge (third-person singular simple present deluges, present participle deluging, simple past and past participle deluged)

1. (transitive) To flood with water.
2. (transitive) To overwhelm.

Translations

References

• 1996, T.F. Hoad, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Etymology, Oxford University Press, ?ISBN

See also

• inundate

Middle English

Alternative forms

• diluge

Etymology

From Old French deluge, from Latin d?luvium.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?d??liu?d?(?)/

Noun

deluge (Late Middle English)

1. A deluge; a massive flooding or raining.
2. (rare, figuratively) Any cataclysmic or catastrophic event.

Descendants

• English: deluge

References

• “d?l??e, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-08-12.

Old French

Etymology

From Latin d?luvium.

Noun

deluge m (oblique plural deluges, nominative singular deluges, nominative plural deluge)

1. large flood

Descendants

• French: déluge
• ? Middle English: deluge
  • English: deluge

English

Etymology

From Middle English drownen, drounen, drunen (“to drown”), of obscure and uncertain origin.

The OED suggests an unattested Old English form *dr?nian . Harper 2001 points to Old English druncnian, ?edruncnian (> 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.

Pronunciation

• enPR: droun, IPA^(key): /d?a?n/, [d??????a?n]
• Rhymes: -a?n

Verb

drown (third-person singular simple present drowns, present participle drowning, simple past and past participle drowned)

1. (intransitive) To die from suffocation while immersed in water or other fluid.

   When I was a baby, I nearly drowned in the bathtub.

   • 1594, William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece,^[1]

     Old woes, not infant sorrows, bear them mild;

     Continuance tames the one; the other wild,

     Like an unpractised swimmer plunging still,

     With too much labour drowns for want of skill.

2. (transitive) To kill by suffocating in water or another liquid.

   The car thief fought with an officer and tried to drown a police dog before being shot while escaping.

   • c. 1590, William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 2, Act III, Scene 2,^[2]

     The pretty-vaulting sea refused to drown me,

     Knowing that thou wouldst have me drown’d on shore,

     With tears as salt as sea, through thy unkindness:

3. (intransitive) To be flooded: to be inundated with or submerged in (literally) water or (figuratively) other things; to be overwhelmed.

   We are drowning in information but starving for wisdom.

   • 1990, House of Cards, Season 1, Episode 2:

     Penny Guy: Bloody hell, Rog, whadda you want?
     Roger O'Neill: To drown in your arms and hide in yer eyes, darlin'.

4. (transitive, figuratively) To inundate, submerge, overwhelm.

   He drowns his sorrows in buckets of chocolate ice cream.

   • 1599, John Davies, Nosce Teipsum, London: John Standish, p. 19,^[3]

     Though most men being in sensuall pleasures drownd,

     It seemes their Soules but in the Senses are.

   • c. 1606, William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, Act II, Scene 7,^[4]

     Come, thou monarch of the vine,

     Plumpy Bacchus with pink eyne!

     In thy fats our cares be drown’d,

     With thy grapes our hairs be crown’d:

   • 1713, Joseph Addison, Cato, a Tragedy, London: J. Tonson, Act II, Scene 1, p. 23,^[5]

     My private Voice is drown’d amid the Senate’s.

   • 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, Dublin: John Smith, Volume 2, Book 7, Chapter 14, pp. 71-72,^[6]

     Unluckily that worthy Officer having, in a literal Sense, taken his Fill of Liquor, had been some Time retired to his Bolster, where he was snoaring so loud, that it was not easy to convey a Noise in at his Ears capable of drowning that which issued from his Nostrils.

5. (transitive, figuratively, usually passive) To obscure, particularly amid an overwhelming volume of other items.

   The answers intelligence services seek are often drowned in the flood of information they can now gather.

Usage notes

When using the term figuratively to describe overwhelming sounds, the form drown out is now usually employed.

Synonyms

• (to cover, as with water): flood, inundate

Derived terms

Translations

References

Anagrams

• N-word, n-word

Welsh

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /drou?n/

Verb

drown

1. Soft mutation of trown.

Mutation