different between heavy vs feather

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English hevy, hevi?, from Old English hefi?, hefe?, hæfi? (“heavy; important, grave, severe, serious; oppressive, grievous; slow, dull”), from Proto-West Germanic *hab?g (“heavy, hefty, weighty”), from Proto-Germanic *hab?gaz (“heavy, hefty, weighty”), from Proto-Indo-European *keh?p- (“to take, grasp, hold”), equivalent to heave +? -y.

Pronunciation

• enPR: hev?i
• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /?h?.vi/
• (General Australian, General New Zealand) IPA^(key): /?he.vi/
• Rhymes: -?vi

Adjective

heavy (comparative heavier, superlative heaviest)

1. (of a physical object) Having great weight.
2. (of a topic) Serious, somber.
3. Not easy to bear; burdensome; oppressive.

   • The hand of the Lord was heavy upon them of Ashdod.

   • 1814, William Wordsworth, The Excursion

     Sent hither by my Husband to impart the heavy news.

4. (Britain, slang, dated) Good.

5. (dated, late 1960s, 1970s, US) Profound.

6. (of a rate of flow) High, great.
   • 1998, Stanley George Clayton, ""Menstruation" in Encyclopedia Britannica

     The ovarian response to gonadotropic hormones may be erratic at first, so that irregular or heavy bleeding sometimes occurs

7. (slang) Armed.

8. (music) Louder, more distorted.

9. (of weather) Hot and humid.
10. (of a person) Doing the specified activity more intensely than most other people.

11. (of food) High in fat or protein; difficult to digest.

12. Of great force, power, or intensity; deep or intense.
    • 1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Land That Time Forgot Chapter IV

      The surf was not heavy, and there was no undertow, so we made shore easily, effecting an equally easy landing.

13. Laden to a great extent.

14. Laden with that which is weighty; encumbered; burdened; bowed down, either with an actual burden, or with grief, pain, disappointment, etc.
    • 1613, William Browne, Britannia's Pastorals

      Seating himselfe within a darkesome cave, / (Such places heavy Saturnists doe crave,) / Where yet the gladsome day was never seene […]

15. Slow; sluggish; inactive; or lifeless, dull, inanimate, stupid.
    • a heavy, dull, degenerate mind

    • Neither [is] his ear heavy, that it cannot hear.

16. Impeding motion; cloggy; clayey.

    a heavy road; a heavy soil

17. Not raised or leavened.

18. (of wines or spirits) Having much body or strength.
19. (obsolete) With child; pregnant.
20. (physics) Containing one or more isotopes that are heavier than the normal one.
21. (petroleum) Having high viscosity.

Synonyms

• sweer/swear

Antonyms

• light

Derived terms

Pages starting with “heavy”.

Related terms

• heave
• heft

Translations

Adverb

heavy (comparative more heavy, superlative most heavy)

1. In a heavy manner; weightily; heavily; gravely.

   heavy laden with their sins

2. (colloquial, nonstandard) To a great degree; greatly.
3. (India, colloquial) very

Derived terms

• hang heavy
• heavy-laden

Noun

heavy (plural heavies or heavys)

1. A villain or bad guy; the one responsible for evil or aggressive acts.

   With his wrinkled, uneven face, the actor always seemed to play the heavy in films.

2. (slang) A doorman, bouncer or bodyguard.

   A fight started outside the bar but the heavies came out and stopped it.

3. (journalism, slang, chiefly in the plural) A newspaper of the quality press.
   • 1973, Allen Hutt, The changing newspaper (page 151)

     The comment may be offered here that the 'heavies' have been the Design Award's principal scorers, both in the overall bronze plaque days and, since, in the Daily/Sunday Class 1.

   • 2006, Richard Keeble, The Newspapers Handbook

     Reviewers in the heavies aim to impress with the depth of their knowledge and appreciation.

4. (Should we move, merge or split⁽⁺⁾ this sense?) (aviation) A large multi-engined aircraft. (The term heavy normally follows the call-sign when used by air traffic controllers.)

Derived terms

• brain heavy
• dog heavy

Translations

Verb

heavy (third-person singular simple present heavies, present participle heavying, simple past and past participle heavied)

1. (often with "up") To make heavier. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
2. To sadden. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
3. (Australia, New Zealand, informal) To use power or wealth to exert influence on, e.g., governments or corporations; to pressure.

   The union was well known for the methods it used to heavy many businesses.

   • 1985, Australian House of Representatives, House of Representatives Weekly Hansard, Issue 11, Part 1, page 1570,

     […] the Prime Minister sought to evade the simple fact that he heavied Mr Reid to get rid of Dr Armstrong.

   • 2001, Finola Moorhead, Darkness More Visible, Spinifex Press, Australia, page 557,

     But he is on the wrong horse, heavying me. My phone?s tapped. Well, he won?t find anything.

   • 2005, David Clune, Ken Turner (editors), The Premiers of New South Wales, 1856-2005, Volume 3: 1901-2005, page 421,

     But the next two days of the Conference also produced some very visible lobbying for the succession and apparent heavying of contenders like Brereton, Anderson and Mulock - much of it caught on television.

Etymology 2

heave +? -y

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?hi?vi/

Adjective

heavy (comparative more heavy, superlative most heavy)

1. Having the heaves.

   a heavy horse

See also

• heavy cake

References

• heavy at OneLook Dictionary Search

Anagrams

• Havey, Yahve

German

Etymology

From English heavy.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?h?vi/

Adjective

heavy (not comparable)

1. (predicative, colloquial, probably slightly dated) heavy; intense; serious; shocking (extraordinary, especially in a bad way)

   Synonyms: heftig, krass, nicht ohne, ein starkes Stück

Spanish

Etymology

From English heavy (metal).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?xebi/, [?xe.??i]

Adjective

heavy (plural heavys)

1. heavy (pertaining to heavy metal)
2. heavy (intense)

English

Alternative forms

• fether (archaic)

Etymology

From Middle English feþer, from Old English feþer, from Proto-West Germanic *feþru, from Proto-Germanic *feþr? (compare West Frisian fear, German Low German Fedder, Dutch veder, veer, German Feder, Yiddish ??????? (feder), Danish fjer, Swedish fjäder, Norwegian Bokmål fjær, fjør, Norwegian Nynorsk fjør), from Proto-Indo-European *péth?r? (“feather, wing”), from *peth?- (“to fly”). Cognate with Ancient Greek ??????? (pétomai), Albanian shpend (“bird”), Latin penna, Old Armenian ??? (t?i?).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?f?ð.?(?)/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?f?ð.?/
• Rhymes: -?ð?(r)
• Hyphenation: feath?er

Noun

feather (plural feathers)

1. A branching, hair-like structure that grows on the bodies of birds, used for flight, swimming, protection and display.
   • 1873, W. K. Brooks, "A Feather", Popular Science Monthly, volume IV, page 687

     Notice, too, that the shaft is not straight, but bent so that the upper surface of the feather is convex, and the lower concave.
2. Long hair on the lower legs of a dog or horse, especially a draft horse, notably the Clydesdale breed. Narrowly only the rear hair.

   Synonyms: feathers, feathering, horsefeathers

   Antonym: spats

3. One of the fins or wings on the shaft of an arrow.
4. A longitudinal strip projecting from an object to strengthen it, or to enter a channel in another object and thereby prevent displacement sideways but permit motion lengthwise; a spline.
5. Kind; nature; species (from the proverbial phrase "birds of a feather").
6. One of the two shims of the three-piece stone-splitting tool known as plug and feather or plug and feathers; the feathers are placed in a borehole and then a wedge is driven between them, causing the stone to split.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Knight to this entry?)

7. The angular adjustment of an oar or paddle-wheel float, with reference to a horizontal axis, as it leaves or enters the water.
8. Anything petty or trifling; a whit or jot.
   • 1823, An Ecclesiastical Memoir of Essex Street Religious Society

     To some pew purchasers he gave deeds, to others he gave, none, but both were promised security, and both it seems were equally secure, for the pew deed as Mr. Melledge declared to Mr. G. was not worth a feather.

9. (hunting, in the plural) Partridges and pheasants, as opposed to rabbits and hares (called fur).
10. (rail transport) A junction indicator attached to a colour-light signal at an angle, which lights up, typically with four white lights in a row, when a diverging route is set up.

Synonyms

• plume (archaic, literary and poetic), pluma (archaic)

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

feather (third-person singular simple present feathers, present participle feathering, simple past and past participle feathered)

1. To cover or furnish with feathers; (when of an arrow) to fletch.
   • 1912, Frances, Object-lessons on Temperance, Or, The Indian Maiden and Her White Deer, page 117:

     Olondaw had taught Hazeleye how to use her bow and arrows, and that each might know the result of his or her own shooting, he had feathered her arrow with white and his own with red. How strange are the events of this life, […]

   • 2007, Thomas Perry, Vanishing Act, Ballantine Books (?ISBN), page 302:

     She feathered her arrows in the Seneca fashion, two lengths of feather tied on with a spiral twist, so they would spin in flight. The trick was to glue both sides in place with a little sticky pine sap so they would stay put while she tied them […]

2. To adorn, as if with feathers; to fringe.
3. To arrange in the manner or appearance of feathers.

4. (transitive, intransitive, rowing) To rotate the oars while they are out of the water to reduce wind resistance.
5. (aeronautics) To streamline the blades of an aircraft's propeller by rotating them perpendicular to the axis of the propeller when the engine is shut down so that the propeller does not windmill during flight.

6. (carpentry, engineering) To finely shave or bevel an edge.
7. (computer graphics) To intergrade or blend the pixels of an image with those of a background or neighboring image.
8. To render light as a feather; to give wings to.
   • c. 1650, Robert Loveday, letter to Mr. C.

     The Polonian story, which perhaps may feather some tedious hours.

9. To enrich; to exalt; to benefit.

   • They stuck not to say that the king cared not to plume his nobility and people to feather himself.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Dryden to this entry?)

10. To tread, as a cock.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Dryden to this entry?)

11. (snooker, billiards) To move the cue back and forth along the bridge in preparation for striking the cue ball.
12. (snooker, billiards) To accidentally touch the cue ball with the tip of the cue when taking aim.
13. To touch lightly, like (or as if with) a feather.
    • 2001, Joan Hohl, Maybe Tomorrow, Zebra Books (?ISBN), page 186:

      His breath feathered her lips; her spine, her legs weakened, went soft at the wafting warmth.

    • 2006, Gary Parker, Her Daddy's Eyes, Baker Books (?ISBN), page 143:

      A soft breeze feathered her face and hair. The smell of honeysuckle blanketed the air. She concentrated on shutting out every sound except the whisper of her heart. Gradually the inner distractions became fewer.

14. To move softly, like a feather.
    • 2005, Radclyffe, Justice Served, Bold Strokes Books Inc (?ISBN):

      She feathered her fingers through Mitchell's hair. “Besides, I like you a whole lot better than Frye.”

    • 2011, L.L. Raand, Blood Hunt, Bold Strokes Books Inc (?ISBN):

      “Asking me not to breathe would be simpler,” Drake said. “If I could spare you what's coming—” “No.” Drake feathered her fingers through Sylvan's hair. “We fight together.” Sylvan nodded and relaxed in her embrace. Drake didn't fear death.

Derived terms

• feathered
• feather one's nest
• feather one's own nest
• tar and feather

Translations

Further reading

• feather on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

References

• Horse Glossary
• Horses Glossary
• Cowboy Dictionary – Cowboy F: Feather

Anagrams

• feareth, terefah