# yearn

Pronunciation: say "YURN" US /jɝn/, UK /jɜːn/

## Verb

1. To have a strong desire or longing for something, often something absent, lost, or belonging to the past, or to want very much to do something.
   - Simple: To want something very much, often something you do not have or that is gone.
   - _Many city workers yearn for a quiet life in the country._
   - _After six months at sea, the crew yearned to set foot on dry land._
2. Of music, words, or a performer: to express or convey strong desire or longing.
   - Simple: Of music, words, or a singer: to sound full of strong longing or desire.
   - _In the slow movement, the cellos yearn beneath a thin, high melody._
   - _Every page of her late poems yearns, though she never names what she wants._

## Verb

3. To feel strong affection, love, sympathy, or a similar emotion toward someone. *(dated)*
   - Simple: To feel strong love or care for someone, or to feel sorry for them.
4. To suffer anguish or sorrow, as in grief or mourning. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: To feel deep sadness or pain, especially over a loss.
5. To stir strong affection, love, sympathy, or similar feelings in someone; also, to grieve or pain someone. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: To make someone feel strong love or care, or to make them feel sad or hurt.

## Other meanings

- (noun) A strong desire or longing for someone or something.
- (verb) In some northern dialects: of milk, to curdle, or to make milk curdle, as part of making cheese.
- (verb) To make cheese from curdled milk, or (of cheese) to be made in this way.

## Origin

*gʰer-, a Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to yearn for," gave Proto-Germanic *gernaz ("eager, willing"), and adding a suffix that turns adjectives into verbs produced *girnijaną ("to desire, want"). This passed through *girnijan, the Proto-West Germanic form meaning "to be eager for, desire," to Old English ġeornan ("to beg, to desire, yearn") and then to Middle English yernen or yern ("to feel or express desire, to long for, to lust after, to ask for"), the source of the verb. The noun was formed from the verb.

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