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Origin and history of weep

weep(v.)

Middle English wepen, "express sorrow, grief, or anguish by outcry;" from Old English wepan "shed tears, cry; bewail, mourn over; complain" (class VII strong verb; past tense weop, past participle wopen), from Proto-Germanic *wopjan (source also of Old Norse op, Old High German wuof "shout, shouting, crying," Old Saxon wopian, Gothic wopjan "to shout, cry out, weep").

This is reconstructed to be from PIE *wab- "to cry, scream" (source also of Latin vapulare "to be flogged;" Old Church Slavonic vupiti "to call," vypu "gull").

Over time the sense in English became limited toward "shed tears." In Middle English breste a-wepe was "burst into tears." By 1590s or "to drop or flow as tears." Of stones, walls, etc., "give out moisture, be damp," from c. 1400. Related: Wept; weeping.

Entries linking to weep

weeping(adj.)

"that weeps; accompanied by tears," late Old English, present-participle adjective from weep (v.). Related: Weepingly.

Used of various trees whose branches arch downward and suggest drooping, such as weeping elm (c. 1600); weeping cherry (1824). Weeping willow (French saule pleureur, German trauerweide), introduced in England from the region of the Euphrates, is recorded by 1728 in Batty Langley's "New Principles of Gardening," which notes "the weeping or mourning Willow that was brought from Babylon, and now in great Plenty and Perfection in England. Particularly, in the Gardens of the late Thomas Vernon Esq., at his seat of Twickenham Park in Middlesex."

It replaced the cypress as a funerary emblem. There are also weeping ash, birch, oak.

beweep(v.)

Old English bewepan "to weep over," cognate with Old Frisian biwepa, Old Saxon biwopian; see be- + weep. Related: Bewept.

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Trends of weep

adapted from books.google.com/ngrams/ with a 7-year moving average; ngrams are probably unreliable.

More to explore

cry

mid-13c., "yell (something) out, utter" (transitive); c. 1300, "beg, implore; speak earnestly and loudly; advertise by calling out," from Old French crier, from Vulgar Latin *critare, from Latin quiritare "to wail, shriek" (source of Italian gridare, Old Spanish cridar, Spanish a

regret

prefix (see re-), + -greter, which is possibly from Frankish or some other Germanic source (compare Old English grætan "to weep...;" Old Norse grata "to weep, groan"), from Proto-Germanic *gretan "weep."...

lamentation

nominative lamentatio) "a wailing, moaning, a weeping," noun of action from past-participle stem of lamentari "to wail, moan, weep...De Vaan compares Sanskrit rayati "barks," Armenian lam "to weep, bewail;" Lithuanian loti, Old Church Slavonic lajati "to...

greet

" (via notion of "cause to speak"), causative of Proto-Germanic *grætanan, root of Old English grætan (Anglian gretan) "weep...Greet still can mean "cry, weep" in Scottish & northern England dialect, though this might be from a different root....

feeble

Modern French faible), a dissimilation of Latin flebilis "lamentable," literally "that is to be wept over," from flere "weep...

goetia

from Greek goēteia, from goēs, goētos "sorcerer, enchanter; charlatan," which is probably connected to goaō "to groan, weep...The connection to goaō "to groan, weep" is suggested by 10c. in Suda, a sort of early encyclopedia written in Byzantine Greek...

explore

examine, explore," said to be originally a hunters' term meaning "set up a loud cry," from ex "out" (see ex-) + plorare "to weep...

blubber

late 14c., blober "a bubble, bubbling water; foaming waves," probably echoic of bubbling water. The original notion of "bubbling, foaming" survives in the figurative verbal meaning "to weep, cry" (c. 1400). The meaning "whale fat" is attested from 1660s; earlier it was used in re

snivel

Middle English, from Old English *snyflan "run at the nose" (implied in snyflung "running of the nose"), verb from snofl "nasal mucus;" see snout. The meaning "be in an (affected) tearful state, utter hypocritical expressions of contrition or regret" is from 1680s. Related: Snive

sniffle

"snuffle slightly," 1819, frequentative form of sniff (v.). Related: Sniffled; sniffling. As a noun, "an act of sniffling," by 1880; the sniffles "runny nose, head cold" is recorded from 1825. Sniffly (1897) tends to refer to physical symptoms, "characterized by sniffling;" while

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