different between reckon vs defer

English

Alternative forms

• reckin (dialectal)
• recken (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English rekenen, from Old English recenian (“to pay; arrange, dispose, reckon”) and ?erecenian (“to explain, recount, relate”); both from Proto-Germanic *rekan?n? (“to count, explain”), from Proto-Germanic *rekanaz (“swift, ready, prompt”), from Proto-Indo-European *h?re?- (“to make straight or right”).

Cognate with Scots rekkin (“to ennumerate, mention, narrate, rehearse, count, calculate, compute”), Saterland Frisian reekenje (“to calculate, figure, reckon”), West Frisian rekkenje (“to account, tally, calculate, figure”), Dutch rekenen (“to count, calculate, reckon”), German Low German reken (“to reckon”), German rechnen (“to count, reckon, calculate”), Swedish räkna (“to count, calculate, reckon”), Icelandic reikna (“to calculate”), Latin rectus (“straight, right”). See also reck, reach.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /???k?n/
• Rhymes: -?k?n

Verb

reckon (third-person singular simple present reckons, present participle reckoning, simple past and past participle reckoned)

1. To count; to enumerate; to number; also, to compute; to calculate.
   • I reckoned above two hundred and fifty on the outside of the church.
2. To count as in a number, rank, or series; to estimate by rank or quality; to place by estimation; to account; to esteem; to repute.
   • 1671, John Milton, Samson Agonistes

     For him I reckon not in high estate Whom long descent of birth, Or the sphere of fortune, raises

3. To charge, attribute, or adjudge to one, as having a certain quality or value.
   • 1611, King James Version, Romans 4:9

     […] faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness.

   • Without her eccentricities being reckoned to her for a crime.

4. (colloquial) To conclude, as by an enumeration and balancing of chances; hence, to think; to suppose; -- followed by an objective clause

   I reckon he won't try that again.

   • 1611, King James Version, Romans 8:18

     For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.

   • 1611, King James Version, Romans 6:11

     Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin.
5. To reckon with something or somebody or not, i.e to reckon without something or somebody: to take into account, deal with, consider or not, i.e. to misjudge, ignore, not take into account, not deal with, not consider or fail to consider; e.g. reckon without one's host
6. (intransitive) To make an enumeration or computation; to engage in numbering or computing.
7. To come to an accounting; to draw up or settle accounts; to examine and strike the balance of debt and credit; to adjust relations of desert or penalty.

   • Parfay," sayst thou, sometime he reken shall."

Synonyms

• number
• enumerate
• compute
• calculate
• estimate
• value
• esteem
• account
• repute

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• calculate
• guess

References

• reckon in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Anagrams

• conker, rocken

English

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /d??f??(?)/
• Rhymes: -??(r)
• (US) IPA^(key): /d??f?/
• Hyphenation: de?fer

Etymology 1

Originally a variant of (and hence a doublet of) differ; from Middle English differren (“to postpone”), from Old French differer, from Latin differ?.

Verb

defer (third-person singular simple present defers, present participle deferring, simple past and past participle deferred)

1. (transitive) To delay or postpone
   1. (especially more common, historically) to postpone induction into military service.
2. (American football) After winning the opening coin toss, to postpone until the start of the second half a team's choice of whether to kick off or receive (and to allow the opposing team to make this choice at the start of the first half).
3. (intransitive) To delay, to wait.

Derived terms

• deferral
• deferment

Related terms

• differ

Translations

Etymology 2

From late Middle English differren (“to refer for judgement”), from Middle French déférer, from Latin d?fer?.

Verb

defer (third-person singular simple present defers, present participle deferring, simple past and past participle deferred)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To submit to the opinion or desire of another in respect to their judgment or authority.
2. To render, to offer.
   • 1872, Daniel Brevint, Saul and Samuel at Endor

     worship deferred to the Virgin

Derived terms

• deference

Translations

Anagrams

• freed, refed

Latin

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /?de?.fer/, [?d?e?f?r]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /?de.fer/, [?d???f?r]

Verb

d?fer

1. second-person singular present active imperative of d?fer?