different between dwindle vs windle

English

Etymology

Frequentative form of dwine, from Middle English dwinen, from Old English dw?nan (“to waste away”), equivalent to dwine +? -le, akin to Old Norse dvena/dvína (Danish tvine (“to pine away”), Dutch verdwijnen (“to disappear, dwindle”).

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /?dw?n.d?l/
• Rhymes: -?nd?l

Verb

dwindle (third-person singular simple present dwindles, present participle dwindling, simple past and past participle dwindled)

1. (intransitive) To decrease, shrink, diminish, reduce in size or intensity.
   • 1802, T. Paynell (translator), Erasmus, The Complaint of Peace

     [E]very thing that was improving gradually degenerates and dwindles away to nothing, […]

2. (intransitive, figuratively) To fall away in quality; degenerate, sink.
   • 1766, Oliver Goldsmith, Vicar, III

     The flattery of his friends began to dwindle into simple approbation.

   • 1919, Boris Sidis, The Source and Aim of Human Progress

     The larger the empire, the more dwindles the mind of the citizen.
3. (transitive) To lessen; to bring low.

   • Our drooping days are dwindled down to nought.

4. To break up or disperse.

Derived terms

Translations

References

Anagrams

• windled

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?w?nd?l/

Etymology 1

Perhaps from wind.

Noun

windle (plural windles)

1. (Britain, dialect) The redwing.

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English windle, windel, from Old English windel (“basket”), from Proto-Germanic *windilaz (“wrap; diaper; plaitwork; basket”), equivalent to wind +? -le. Related to Old English windan (“to wind, twist”).

Noun

windle (plural windles)

1. An old English measure of corn, half a bushel.
   • 1882, James Edwin Thorold Rogers, A History of Agriculture and Prices in England, Volume 4, p. 208.

     In the Derby household book of 1561, wheat, malt, and oats are sold by the quarter and the windle, in which the quarter clearly contained sixteen windles, and must have been a wholly different measure from that which we are familiar.
2. Any dried-out grass leaf or stalk in a field
   1. Also any of several species of grasses that leave such leaves or stalks, such as dog-tail grass, Plantago lanceolata
3. Bent grass (Agrostis spp.).
4. A windlass
5. A reel for winding something into a bundle, such as winding string or yarn into skeins or straw into bundles.

Verb

windle (third-person singular simple present windles, present participle windling, simple past and past participle windled)

1. (transitive) To bind straw into bundles.

References

• windle at OneLook Dictionary Search
• windle in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Anagrams

• wilden