QUIZ
WILL YOU SAIL OR STUMBLE ON THESE GRAMMAR QUESTIONS?
Smoothly step over to these common grammar mistakes that trip many people up. Good luck!
Question 1 of 7
Fill in the blank: I can’t figure out _____ gave me this gift.
Idioms about wear
- to diminish; weaken: My patience is wearing thin.
- to become less appealing, interesting, tolerable, etc.: childish antics that soon wore thin.
wear thin,
Origin of wear
First recorded before 900; (verb) Middle English weren “to have (clothes) on the body, waste, damage, suffer waste or damage,” Old English werian; cognate with Old Norse verja, Gothic wasjan “to clothe”; (noun) late Middle English were “act of carrying on the body,” derivative of the verb; akin to Latin vestis clothing (see vest)
OTHER WORDS FROM wear
wearer, nounre·wear, verb, re·wore, re·worn, re·wear·ing.Words nearby wear
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
How to use wear in a sentence
British Dictionary definitions for wear (1 of 3)
wear1
/ (wɛə) /
verb wears, wearing, wore or worn
noun
Derived forms of wear
wearer, nounWord Origin for wear
Old English werian; related to Old High German werien, Old Norse verja, Gothic vasjan
British Dictionary definitions for wear (2 of 3)
wear2
/ (wɛə) /
verb wears, wearing, wore or worn
nautical to tack by gybing instead of by going through stays
Word Origin for wear
C17: from earlier weare, of unknown origin
British Dictionary definitions for wear (3 of 3)
Wear
/ (wɪə) /
noun
a river in NE England, rising in NW Durham and flowing southeast then northeast to the North Sea at Sunderland. Length: 105 km (65 miles)
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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Other Idioms and Phrases with wear
wear
The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.