different between venom vs spur

English

Etymology

From Middle English venum, venym, from Anglo-Norman venum, venim, venime, from Old French venim, venin, from Vulgar Latin *ven?men, from Latin ven?num, from Proto-Italic *weneznom (“lust, desire”), from Proto-Indo-European *wenh?- (“to strive, wish, love”); see also Sanskrit ???? (vanati, “gain, wish, erotic lust”) and Latin Venus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?v?n?m/

Noun

venom (countable and uncountable, plural venoms)

1. A poison carried by an animal, usually injected into an enemy or prey by biting or stinging.
   • c. 1610, William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale, Act II, Scene 1,^[1]

     […] There may be in the cup

     A spider steep’d, and one may drink, depart,

     And yet partake no venom, for his knowledge

     Is not infected:

   • 1634, John Milton, Arcades in Poems of Mr. John Milton, both English and Latin, London: Humphrey Moseley, Song, p. 54,^[2]

     And from the Boughs brush off the evil dew,

     And heal the harms of thwarting thunder blew,

     Or what the cross dire-looking Planet smites,

     Or hurtfull Worm with canker’d venom bites.

   • 1818, Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, Chapter 20,^[3]

     I will watch with the wiliness of a snake, that I may sting with its venom.

   • 1968, Truman Capote, interview published in Mademoiselle, August 1968,^[4]

     The serious artist […] [is] obsessed by his material; it’s like a venom working in his blood and the art is the antidote.

2. (figuratively) Feeling or speech marked by spite or malice; vitriol.
   • c. 1598, William Shakespeare, Henry V, Act V, Scene 2,^[5]

     The venom of such looks, we fairly hope,

     Have lost their quality, and that this day

     Shall change all griefs and quarrels into love.

   • 1790, Richard Cumberland, The Observer, London: C. Dilly, Volume 5, No. 130, p. 48,^[6]

     […] as I was feasting my jaundiced eye one morning with a certain newspaper, which I was in the habit of employing as the vehicle of my venom, I was startled at discovering myself conspicuously pointed out in an angry column as a cowardly defamer […]

   • 1819, Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor, Chapter 33,^[7]

     “My daughter […] has no occasion to dispute the identity of your person; the venom of your present language is sufficient to remind her that she speaks with the mortal enemy of her father.”

   • 1938, Lawrence Durrell, The Black Book, New York: Open Road, 2012, Book Three,

     History is a study which has none of the venom of reality in it.

   • 2007, Roger Ebert, Your Movie Sucks, Kansas City: Andrews McMeel, Introduction,^[8]

     Some of these reviews were written in joyous zeal. Others with glee. Some in sorrow, some in anger, and a precious few with venom, of which I have a closely guarded supply.

Synonyms

• (poison carried by an animal): atter (archaic, dialectal)

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

venom (third-person singular simple present venoms, present participle venoming, simple past and past participle venomed)

1. (obsolete) To infect with venom; to envenom; to poison.
   • 1566, Thomas Blundeville (translator and editor), The Fower Chiefyst Offices Belongyng to Horsemanshippe, London, Chapter 36,^[9]

     […] washe all the filth away with warme water, and annoynte the place with Hony and Fytch flower myngled together. But beware you touche none of the kirnelles with your bare finger, for feare of venoming the place, which is very apt for a Fistula to breede in.

   • c. 1601, William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, Act V, Scene 3,^[10]

     Let’s leave the hermit pity with our mothers,

     And when we have our armours buckled on,

     The venom’d vengeance ride upon our swords,

     Spur them to ruthful work, rein them from ruth.

   • 1669, John Bunyan, The Holy Citie, or, The New-Jerusalem, London: Francis Smith, Commentary, Chapter 21, Verse 25, pp. 229-230,^[11]

     The Dragon is a venemous beast, and poisoneth all where he lieth; he beats the Earth bare, and venoms it, that it will bear no grass […]

   • 1717, William Stonestreet (translator), “The Story of Ants chang’d to Men” in Samuel Garth (editor), Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. Translated by the most eminent hands, London: Jacob Tonson, Book 7, p. 239,^[12]

     Our Fountains too a dire Infection yield,

     For Crowds of Vipers creep along the Field,

     And with polluted Gore, and baneful Steams,

     Taint all the Lakes, and venom all the Streams.

Derived terms

• venomer

Adjective

venom (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Poisonous, poisoned; (figuratively) pernicious.
   • 1594, William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece,^[13]

     Why should the worm intrude the maiden bud?

     Or hateful cuckoos hatch in sparrows’ nests?

     Or toads infect fair founts with venom mud?

   • c. 1595, William Shakespeare, Richard II, Act II, Scene 1,^[14]

     […] it is stopp’d with other flattering sounds,

     As praises, of whose taste the wise are fond,

     Lascivious metres, to whose venom sound

     The open ear of youth doth always listen;

Anagrams

• Venmo

Middle English

Noun

venom

1. Alternative form of venym

Volapük

Noun

venom

1. poison, venom

See also

• venen
• venod

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /sp??/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /sp?/
• Rhymes: -??(?)

Etymology 1

From Middle English spure, spore, from Old English spura, spora, from Proto-Germanic *spurô, from Proto-Indo-European *sper-, *sperw- (“to twitch, push, fidget, be quick”).

Noun

spur (plural spurs)

1. A rigid implement, often roughly y-shaped, that is fixed to one's heel for the purpose of prodding a horse. Often worn by, and emblematic of, the cowboy or the knight.

   Meronyms: rowel, prick

   • 1786, Francis Grose, A Treatise on Ancient Armour and Weapons, page 22:

     Two sorts of spurs seem to have been in use about the time of the Conquest, one called a pryck, having only a single point like the gaffle of a fighting cock; the other consisting of a number of points of considerable length, radiating from and revolving on a center, thence named the rouelle or wheel spur.

2. A jab given with the spurs.
   • 1832, The Atheneum (volume 31, page 493)

     I had hardly said the word, when Kit jumped into the saddle, and gave his horse a whip and a spur — and off it cantered, as if it were in as great a hurry to be married as Kit himself.

3. (figuratively) Anything that inspires or motivates, as a spur does a horse.
4. An appendage or spike pointing rearward, near the foot, for instance that of a rooster.
5. Any protruding part connected at one end, for instance a highway that extends from another highway into a city.
6. Roots, tree roots.
7. (geology) A mountain that shoots from another mountain or range and extends some distance in a lateral direction, or at right angles.
8. A spiked iron worn by seamen upon the bottom of the boot, to enable them to stand upon the carcass of a whale to strip off the blubber.
9. (carpentry) A brace strengthening a post and some connected part, such as a rafter or crossbeam; a strut.
10. (architecture) The short wooden buttress of a post.
11. (architecture) A projection from the round base of a column, occupying the angle of a square plinth upon which the base rests, or bringing the bottom bed of the base to a nearly square form. It is generally carved in leafage.
12. Ergotized rye or other grain.
13. A wall in a fortification that crosses a part of a rampart and joins to an inner wall.
14. (shipbuilding) A piece of timber fixed on the bilgeways before launching, having the upper ends bolted to the vessel's side.
15. (shipbuilding) A curved piece of timber serving as a half to support the deck where a whole beam cannot be placed.
16. (mining) A branch of a vein.
17. (rail transport) A very short branch line of a railway line.
18. (transport) A short branch road of a motorway, freeway or major road.
19. (botany) A short thin side shoot from a branch, especially one that bears fruit or, in conifers, the shoots that bear the leaves.

Derived terms

• spur gear
• spur-leather
• spur-of-the-moment
• spur road

Translations

Verb

spur (third-person singular simple present spurs, present participle spurring, simple past and past participle spurred)

1. (transitive) To prod (especially a horse) on the side or flank, with the intent to urge motion or haste, to gig.
   • 1592, William Shakespeare, Richard III, Act V, Scene III, line 339:

     Draw, archers, draw your arrows to the head! Spur your proud horses hard, and ride in blood; Amaze the welkin with your broken staves!

2. (transitive) To urge or encourage to action, or to a more vigorous pursuit of an object

   Synonyms: incite, stimulate, instigate, impel, drive; see also Thesaurus:incite

   • 1599, William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, Act III, Scene IV, line 4.

     My desire / (More sharp than filed steel) did spur me forth...
3. (transitive) To put spurs on.

4. (intransitive) To press forward; to travel in great haste.

Derived terms

• spur on

Translations

Etymology 2

See sparrow.

Noun

spur (plural spurs)

1. A tern.

Etymology 3

Short for spurious.

Noun

spur (plural spurs)

1. (electronics) A spurious tone, one that interferes with a signal in a circuit and is often masked underneath that signal.

Etymology 4

Noun

spur (plural spurs)

1. The track of an animal, such as an otter; a spoor.

Translations

Etymology 5

Verb

spur (third-person singular simple present spurs, present participle spurring, simple past and past participle spurred)

1. (obsolete, dialectal) Alternative form of speer.
   • 1638, Thomas Heywood, "The Rape of Lucrece. A true Roman Tragedy", in The Dramatic Works of Thomas Heywood, Vol. V, John Pearson, 1874, pages 230 & 231.

   • The Pall Mall Magazine, Vol. 33, 1904, page 435.

Anagrams

• Prus, purs, surp

Middle English

Noun

spur

1. Alternative form of spore

Scots

Alternative forms

• sparra
• spug
• spuggie
• speug

Noun

spur (plural spurs)

1. sparrow

References

• “spur” in the Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries.