different between smash vs thwart

English

Etymology

From a blend of smack +? mash. Compare Swedish smask (“a light explosion, crack, report”), dialectal Swedish smaska (“to smack, kiss”), Danish smaske (“to smack with the lips”), Low German smaksen (“to smack with the lips, kiss”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /smæ?/
• Rhymes: -æ?

Noun

smash (plural smashes)

1. The sound of a violent impact; a violent striking together.

2. (Britain, colloquial) A traffic collision.

3. (colloquial) Something very successful or popular (as music, food, fashion, etc); a hit.
   • 2019, Ginaluca Russo, "Taylor Swift Stuns In a Periwinkle Ruffle Mini Dress on the Billboard Music Awards Red Carpet", Teen Vogue, 1 May 2019:

     All together, this look is a smash in our books.
4. (tennis) A very hard overhead shot hit sharply downward.
5. (colloquial, archaic) A bankruptcy.
6. A kind of julep cocktail containing chunks of fresh fruit that can be eaten after finishing the drink.

Synonyms

• (sound of a violent impact): crash
• (colloquial: traffic accident): crash
• (colloquial: something very successful): smash hit

Descendants

• ? Czech: sme?
• ? Serbo-Croatian: sme?

Translations

Verb

smash (third-person singular simple present smashes, present participle smashing, simple past and past participle smashed)

1. To break (something brittle) violently.
   • 1895, H. G. Wells, The Time Machine, Chapter X

     Now, I still think that for this box of matches to have escaped the wear of time for immemorial years was a strange, and for me, a most fortunate thing. Yet oddly enough I found here a far more unlikely substance, and that was camphor. I found it in a sealed jar, that, by chance, I supposed had been really hermetically sealed. I fancied at first the stuff was paraffin wax, and smashed the jar accordingly. But the odor of camphor was unmistakable.

2. (intransitive) To be destroyed by being smashed.

3. To hit extremely hard.

4. (figuratively) To ruin completely and suddenly.

5. (transitive, figuratively) To defeat overwhelmingly; to gain a comprehensive success over.

   I really smashed that English exam.

6. (US) To deform through continuous pressure.

7. (transitive, slang, vulgar) To have sexual intercourse with.
   • 2020 November 7, Dave Chappelle on Saturday Night Live:

     Farmersonly.com. A website that begs the question, what kind of bitch only smashes with farmers?

Synonyms

• (break violently): dash, shatter
• (be destroyed by being smashed): shatter
• (hit extremely hard): pound, thump, wallop; see also Thesaurus:hit
• (ruin completely and suddenly): dash
• (defeat overwhelmingly): slaughter, trounce
• (have sexual intercourse with): coitize, go to bed with, sleep with; see also Thesaurus:copulate with

Descendants

• ? Catalan: esmaixar

Translations

Related terms

Anagrams

• HMSAS, SAHMs, Sahms, Shams, shams

French

Etymology

Borrowed from English smash.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sma?/

Noun

smash m (plural smashs)

1. (tennis) smash

Related terms

• smasher

Further reading

• “smash” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Italian

Etymology

Borrowed from English smash.

Noun

smash m (invariable)

1. smash (tennis shot)

Portuguese

Etymology

Borrowed from English smash.

Noun

smash m (plural smashes)

1. (tennis) smash (overhead shot hit sharply downward)

English

Etymology

The adjective is derived from Early Middle English thwert, thwerte, thuart, thurt, thurte, thwart, thwarte, twart, twarte, twhart, twhert, twort, þuert, þwerrt, þwert, þwerte, ðwert (“crosswise, transverse; counter, opposing; contrary, obstinate”), borrowed from Old Norse þvert (“across, athwart”), originally the neuter form of þverr (“across, transverse”), from Proto-Germanic *þwerhaz (“cross; adverse”) (altered or influenced by Proto-Germanic *þweran? (“to stir; to swirl; to turn”)), from Proto-Germanic *þerh-, probably from Proto-Indo-European *terk?- (“to spin; to turn”).

The English adjective is cognate with Danish tvær (“sullen, sulky”), Gothic ???????????????????????? (þwairs, “angry”), Middle Dutch dwers, dwars (modern Dutch dwars (“crosswise, transverse; slantwise, askew; stubbornly disobedient”)), Norwegian tvert, tvært, Old Frisian þweres, dwers (Saterland Frisian twars, West Frisian dwers, dwerz (“across, to the other side of; beyond”)), Middle Low German dwers, dwars (Low German dwars (“contrary; cross-grained”)), Old English þweorh (“transverse; perverse; angry, cross”), Old High German twer (Middle High German twer, quer, modern German quer (“crosswise; cross”)), Swedish tvär (“across, transverse; of a curve: sharp; immediate, sudden; grumpy, stubborn”). It is related to queer.

The adverb is derived from Middle English thwert, ywerte (“crosswise; across the grain”); the Middle English Dictionary suggests the adverb was derived from the adjective, while the Oxford English Dictionary notes that the adverb is attested earlier than the adjective.

The verb is derived from Middle English thwerten, thwert, thwarten, þwerten (“to lie across; to oppose, to thwart”), and further from the adverb and perhaps also the adjective.

Noun sense 1 (“a seat across a boat on which a rower may sit”) may be derived from the adverb or adjective, from the position of the seat across the length of the boat, while noun sense 3 (“(rare) an act of thwarting”) is derived from the verb. Compare Middle English thwert (“in in thwert: crosswise”), from the adjective.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?w??t/
• (General American) enPR: thwôrt, IPA^(key): /?w?(?)?t/
• Rhymes: -??(r)t

Adjective

thwart (comparative more thwart, superlative most thwart)

1. Placed or situated across something else; cross, oblique, transverse.
2. (figuratively, dated) Of people: having a tendency to oppose; obstinate, perverse, stubborn.

   Synonyms: cross-grained, froward; see also Thesaurus:obstinate
3. (figuratively, dated) Of situations or things: adverse, unfavourable, unlucky.

   Synonyms: unpropitious, untoward; see also Thesaurus:unlucky

Derived terms

• athwart
• athwartship, athwartships

Related terms

• overthwart
• overthwartly
• overthwartness

Translations

Adverb

thwart (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Across the direction of travel or length of; athwart, crosswise, obliquely, transversely.

Translations

Preposition

thwart

1. (archaic or poetic) Across, athwart.

Verb

thwart (third-person singular simple present thwarts, present participle thwarting, simple past and past participle thwarted)

1. (transitive) To cause to fail; to frustrate, to prevent.

   Synonyms: balk, foil, spoil

   Antonym: promote
2. (transitive, obsolete) To place (something) across (another thing); to position crosswise.
3. (transitive, also figuratively, obsolete) To hinder or obstruct by placing (something) in the way of; to block, to impede, to oppose.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:hinder

4. (transitive, intransitive, obsolete) To move (something) across or counter to; to cross.

Conjugation

Derived terms

• thwarter
• thwartsome

Translations

Noun

thwart (plural thwarts)

1. (nautical) A seat across a boat on which a rower may sit.

   Synonyms: thaught, thawt, (Britain, dialectal) thoft
2. (nautical) A brace, perpendicular to the keel, that helps maintain the beam (“breadth”) of a marine vessel against external water pressure and that may serve to support the rail.
3. (rare) An act of thwarting; something which thwarts; a hindrance, an obstacle.

Translations

References

Further reading

• thwart on Wikipedia.Wikipedia