different between woe vs need

English

Etymology

From Middle English wo, wei, wa, from Old English w?, w?, from Proto-Germanic *wai (interjection), whence also Dutch wee, German Weh, weh, Danish ve, Yiddish ????? (vey). Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wáy (interjection). Compare Latin vae, Albanian vaj, French ouais, Ancient Greek ???? (ouaí), Persian ???? (vây) (Turkish vay, a Persian borrowing), and Armenian ??? (vay).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /w??/
• (General American) enPR: w?, IPA^(key): /wo?/
• Rhymes: -??
• Homophone: whoa (in accents with the wine-whine merger)

Noun

woe (countable and uncountable, plural woes)

1. Great sadness or distress; a misfortune causing such sadness.

   Synonyms: grief, sorrow, misery

   • 1674, John Milton, Paradise Lost

     Thus saying, from her side the fatal key, / Sad instrument of all our woe, she took.

   • 1717, Alexander Pope, Eloisa to Abelard

     Soon as thy letters trembling I unclose / That well-known name awakens all my woes.

   • October 14 2017, Sandeep Moudgal, The Times of India, Rains devastate families, political parties make beeline to apply balm on open wounds

     The Friday night rains which wrecked families in Kurabarahalli saw all the three major political parties making a beeline to express their condolences, listen to their woes and provide compensation in the hope of garnering their goodwill ahead of the 2018 assembly elections.

2. Calamity, trouble.
3. A curse; a malediction.

   • Can there be a woe or curse in all the stores of vengeance equal to the malignity of such a practice?

Derived terms

Translations

Adjective

woe (comparative more woe, superlative most woe)

1. (obsolete) Woeful; sorrowful
   • 1303, Robert of Brunne, Handlyng synne

     hys clerk was wo to do þat dede

   • Wo was the knight and sorroufully he syketh.

Interjection

woe

1. (archaic) An exclamation of grief.

Translations

Anagrams

• owe

Limburgish

Adverb

woe

1. where

Alternative forms

• boe (Maastrichtian)

Middle Dutch

Etymology

From Old Dutch *wuo, from Proto-Germanic *hw?.

Adverb

woe

1. (eastern) Alternative form of hoe

Middle English

Pronoun

woe

1. Alternative form of we (“we”)

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: n?d, IPA^(key): /ni?d/, [n?i?d]
• (General American) IPA^(key): /nid/
• Homophones: knead, kneed
• Rhymes: -i?d

Etymology 1

From Middle English need, nede, a merger of two terms:

• Old English n?ed (West Saxon), n?d (Mercian), n?ad (“necessity, compulsion, want”), from Proto-Germanic *naudiz
• Old English n?od (“desire, longing”), from Proto-Germanic *neudaz (“wish, urge, desire, longing”), from Proto-Indo-European *new- (“to incline, tend, move, push, nod, wave”)

Noun

need (countable and uncountable, plural needs)

1. (countable and uncountable) A requirement for something; something needed.
   • 1650, Jeremy Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living

     Be governed by your needs, not by your fancy.
2. Lack of means of subsistence; poverty; indigence; destitution.

Usage notes

• Adjectives often used with “need”: urgent, dire, desperate, strong, unmet, bad, basic, critical, essential, big, terrible, modest, elementary, daily, everyday, special, educational, environmental, human, personal, financial, emotional, medical, nutritional, spiritual, public, developmental, organizational, legal, fundamental, audio-visual, psychological, corporate, societal, psychosocial, functional, additional, caloric, private, monetary, physiological, mental.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• in need

Etymology 2

From Middle English neden, from Old English n?odian.

Verb

need (third-person singular simple present needs, present participle needing, simple past and past participle needed)

1. (transitive) To have an absolute requirement for.
2. (transitive) To want strongly; to feel that one must have something.
3. (modal verb) To be obliged or required (to do something).

4. (intransitive) To be required; to be necessary.

   • When we have done it, we have done or duty, and all that is in our power, and indeed all that needs.
5. (obsolete, transitive) To be necessary (to someone).

Usage notes

• The verb need is construed in a few different ways:
  • With a direct object, as in “I need your help.”
  • With a to-infinitive, as in “I need to go.” Here, the subject of need serves implicitly as the subject of the infinitive.
  • With a clause of the form “for [object] to [verb phrase]”, or simply “[object] to [verb phrase]” as in “I need for this to happen” or “I need this to happen.” In both variants, the object serves as the subject of the infinitive.
  • As a modal verb, with a bare infinitive; in negative polarity contexts, such as questions (“Need I say more?” “Need you have paid so much?”), with negative expressions such as not (“It need not happen today”; “No one need ever know”), and with similar constructions (“There need only be one”; “it need be signed only by the president”; “I need hardly explain it”). Need in this use does not have inflected forms, aside from the contraction needn’t.
  • With a gerund-participle, as in “The car needs washing”, or (in certain dialects) with a past participle, as in “The car needs washed”^[1] (both meaning roughly “The car needs to be washed”).
  • With a direct object and a predicative complement, as in “We need everyone here on time” (meaning roughly “We need everyone to be here on time”) or “I need it gone” (meaning roughly “I need it to be gone”).
  • In certain dialects, and colloquially in certain others, with an unmarked reflexive pronoun, as in “I need me a car.”
• A sentence such as “I need you to sit down” or “you need to sit down” is politer than the bare command “sit down”, but less polite than “please sit down”. It is considered somewhat condescending and infantilizing, hence dubbed by some “the kindergarten imperative”, but is quite common in American usage.
• In older forms of English, when the pronoun thou was in active use, and verbs used -est for distinct second-person singular indicative forms, the verb need had the form needest, and had neededst for its past tense.
• Similarly, when the ending -eth was in active use for third-person singular present indicative forms, the form needeth was used.

Synonyms

• (desire): desire, wish for, would like, want, will (archaic)
• (lack): be without, lack
• (require): be in need of, require

Derived terms

• a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle
• citation needed
• needed, unneeded
• need-to-know basis

Translations

References

Further reading

• need at OneLook Dictionary Search
• need in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• need in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Anagrams

• Dene, Dené, Eden, Ende, deen, dene, eden, ende

West Frisian

Etymology

From Old Frisian n?d, n?d, from Proto-Germanic *naudiz.

Noun

need c (plural neden)

1. need

Derived terms

• needgefal
• needsaak

Further reading

• “need”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011