different between wiry vs weary

English

Etymology

wire +? -y

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?wa?(?)?i/
• Rhymes: -a???i

Adjective

wiry (comparative wirier, superlative wiriest)

1. Thin, muscular and flexible.

   Don't fight him. He may be small, but he's wiry.

Translations

Polish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?v?i.r?/

Noun

wiry

1. nominative/accusative/vocative plural of wir

English

Etymology

From Middle English wery, weri, from Old English w?ri?, from Proto-Germanic *w?r?gaz, *w?ragaz. Cognate with Saterland Frisian wuurich (“weary, tired”), West Frisian wurch (“tired”), Dutch dialectal wurrig (“exhausted”), Old Saxon w?rig (“weary”), Old High German w?rag, wuarag (“drunken”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /?w???i/
• (Scotland) IPA^(key): /?wi??i/
• Rhymes: -???i
• Hyphenation: wea?ry

Adjective

weary (comparative wearier, superlative weariest)

1. Having the strength exhausted by toil or exertion; tired; fatigued.
   • 1623, William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act 2, Scene IV:

     I care not for my spirits if my legs were not weary.

   • 1863, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Weariness

     [I] am weary, thinking of your task.

   • There was a neat hat-and-umbrella stand, and the stranger's weary feet fell soft on a good, serviceable dark-red drugget, which matched in colour the flock-paper on the walls.

2. Having one's patience, relish, or contentment exhausted; tired; sick.

3. Expressive of fatigue.

4. Causing weariness; tiresome.
   • 1798, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

     There passed a weary time.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:fatigued

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

weary (third-person singular simple present wearies, present participle wearying, simple past and past participle wearied)

1. To make or to become weary.
   • 1599, Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act IV, scene iii

     So shall he waste his means, weary his soldiers,

   • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet, Chapter 4

     Yet there was no time to be lost if I was ever to get out alive, and so I groped with my hands against the side of the grave until I made out the bottom edge of the slab, and then fell to grubbing beneath it with my fingers. But the earth, which the day before had looked light and loamy to the eye, was stiff and hard enough when one came to tackle it with naked hands, and in an hour's time I had done little more than further weary myself and bruise my fingers.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:tire

Derived terms

• unwearied
• unwearying
• weariedly

Translations

See also

• wary

Anagrams

• Erway, Wreay