whilere
/ʍaɪˈleɹ/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
13
Scrabble Score
7
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "VVe met that villen (God from him me bleſſe) / That curſed wight, from whom I ſcapt whyleare, / A man of hell, that cals himſelfe Deſpayre: […]"
- "Thou mak'ſt me merry: I am full of pleaſure, / Let vs be iocond. Will you troule the Catch / You taught me but whileare?"
- "He who with all Heav'ns heraldry whileare / Enter'd the world, now bleeds to give us eaſe; / Alas, how ſoon our ſin / Sore doth begin / His Infancy to ſeaſe!"
- "But who shall teach my harp to gain / A sound of the romantic strain, / Whose Anglo-Norman tones whilere / Could win the Second Henry's ear, / Famed Beauclere called, for that he loved / The minstrel, and his lay approved?"
Etymology
From Middle English whil er, whileere [and other forms], whilom er (“some while ago or before, formerly”), from Old English hwīle ǣr, hwīlum ǣr, from hwīle (accusative singular of hwīl), hwīlum (“at some time in the past, once; sometimes”) (dative plural of hwīl (“period of time, a while”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kʷyeh₁- (“to rest; peace, rest”)) + ǣr (“before”) (ultimately from Proto-Germanic *airiz (“before, earlier”)). The English word is analysable as while + ere.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *kʷyeh₁-, whil er, hwīle ǣr, *airiz
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ʍaɪˈleɹ/
- British English: /ʍaɪˈlɛː/