# wake

Pronunciation: say "WAYK" /weɪk/

## Verb

1. To stop sleeping and become conscious and alert, or to make someone do this.
   - Simple: To stop sleeping, or to make someone stop sleeping.
   - _Soldiers in the field learn to wake at the slightest noise._
   - _She woke suddenly when thunder shook the house._
5. To come, or cause something to come, out of a dormant or inactive state into activity; to arouse a feeling or response.
   - Simple: To make a feeling or activity start, or to become active again after being quiet.
   - _Revolutionary feeling began to wake among the workers._
   - _Her ambition woke after years of quiet routine._
7. To sit up through the night beside a dead body, keeping watch over it.
   - Simple: To stay awake at night beside a dead body, as a way of honoring it.
   - _They waked the fallen soldier in the village hall until morning._
   - _It was the custom to wake the dead before carrying them to the grave._

## Noun

2. The space just behind a fast-moving person or thing; hence, the aftermath or consequences of an event, especially in the phrase 'in the wake of'.
   - Simple: The space just behind something moving fast. It also means the time just after an event, and what it causes.
   - _Critics followed in the politician's wake, eager for a quote._
   - _A pack of photographers trailed in the singer's wake as she hurried through the airport._
3. The trail of disturbed water or air left behind a moving ship, boat, swimmer, animal, or aircraft.
   - Simple: The waves or moving air left behind something like a boat, animal or plane as it moves.
   - _Surfers sometimes ride the wake thrown up by passing boats._
   - _The yacht's wake stretched far across the calm harbor._
4. A vigil kept beside the body of someone who has died, before burial, or a gathering held around the funeral to remember them.
   - Simple: A gathering held after someone dies, where people come together to remember the person.
   - _The wake lasted well into the night, with neighbors trading memories._
   - _After the funeral, the family hosted a wake at a local hall._
6. The condition of not being asleep, or the act of rousing from sleep.
   - Simple: The act of becoming awake, or being awake instead of asleep.
8. A group of vultures that have gathered together.
   - Simple: A group of vultures gathered together in one place.
   - _A wake of vultures had already descended on the fallen buffalo._
   - _From the ridge, they spotted a wake of vultures crowding a kill._
9. A yearly parish festival once held to commemorate a church's dedication, marked by night vigils that later gave way to feasting and rural games.
   - Simple: A yearly village festival once held to mark the founding of a church, with prayers and feasting.
   - _The annual wake drew families from every farm in the parish._
   - _By the eighteenth century the wake had become more about ale and dancing than prayer._

## Verb

10. To sit up late into the night for festive purposes; to hold a night revel. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: To stay up late at night to celebrate and have fun.

## Other meanings

- (verb) To stay awake rather than sleep, especially in order to keep watch.
- (noun) A period of staying awake, especially kept for solemn or festive purposes; a vigil.

## Origin

**Meanings 1, 5, 7, 10** — Two Old English verbs that looked and meant much the same, wacan and wacian, became Middle English waken and wakien and then merged into one. Both trace back through Proto-West Germanic to Proto-Germanic roots.
**Meanings 4, 6, 8–9** — Proto-Germanic *wakō, a relative of the verb *wakjaną, gave Old English wacu, which became Middle English wake.
**Meanings 2–3** — This is probably a borrowing of wake from Middle Low German or Middle Dutch. That word comes from, or is akin to, vǫk, the Old Norse word for "a hole in the ice," which goes back to Proto-Germanic *wakwō ("wetness") and the Proto-Indo-European root *wegʷ-, meaning "wet, moist."

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/wake (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).