eft

See also: EFT and eft-

English

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ɛft/
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɛft

Etymology 1

From Middle English evete, from Old English efete, of unknown origin.

Noun

eft (plural efts)

  1. A newt, especially a smooth newt (Lissotriton vulgaris, syn. Triturus punctatus), of Europe.
    • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
      Only these marishes and myrie bogs, / In which the fearefull ewftes do build their bowres, / Yeeld me an hostry mongst the croking frogs […].
    • 1844, Robert Browning, "Garden Fancies," II. Sibrandus Schafnaburgennis:
      How did he like it when the live creatures
      Tickled and toused and browsed him all over,
      And worm, slug, eft, with serious features
      Came in, each one, for his right of trover?
Usage notes

The term red eft is used for the land-dwelling juvenile stage of the eastern newt (Notophthalmus viridescens). Evet is an older term

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English eft, from Old English eft, æft, from Proto-West Germanic *afti, from Proto-Germanic *afti. Cognate with Old Saxon eft, aft, eht (“again, afterwards”), Middle Low German echt (“again, afterward”). Compare English after, aft.

Adverb

eft (not comparable)

  1. (obsolete) Again; afterwards
Derived terms
Translations

Anagrams

Middle English

Alternative forms

Etymology

Inherited from Old English eft, æft, from Proto-West Germanic *afti, from Proto-Germanic *afti. Compare after.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ɛft/

Adverb

eft

  1. again, another time
  2. back (to a previous place or state)
  3. afterwards, hereafter
  4. likewise, in addition, moreover

Descendants

  • English: eft

Old English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *afti, from Proto-Germanic *afti. Cognate with Old Frisian eft, Old Saxon eft, Old Norse ept, aptr.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /eft/

Adverb

eft

  1. again
    • 996–997, Ælfric of Eynsham, “Saint Maur, Abbot”, in Rev. Walter W. Skeat, M.A., ed. and transl., Aelfric's Lives of Saints (Early English Text Society original series 76), volume I, London: N. Trübner & Co., published 1881, page 161:
      ...and hēt hine warnian, ġif he wolde libban, þæt hē nǣre on ðām mynstre nǣfre eft ġesewen...
      ...and gave orders to warn him, if he wished to live, that he should never be seen in the monastery again...
    • c. 887–900 CE, Alfred the Great [attributed], edited and translated by Henry Lee Hargrove, Ph.D., King Alfred's Old English Version of Augustine's Soliloquies (Yale Studies in English series XIII), New York: Henry Holt and Company, published 1902, page 12:
      Ne āġyf mē nǣfre eft hym,...
      Never again restore me to them,...
    • c. 989–992 CE, Ælfric of Eynsham, “Sermon on the Beginning of Creation”, in Benjamin Thorpe, F.S.A., ed. and transl., The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church, volume I, London: Richard and John E. Taylor, published 1844:
      Þā behēt God þæt hē nolde nǣfre eft eall mancynn mid wætre ācwellan.
      Then God promised that he would never again destroy all of humanity with water.
  2. back (of return or reversal)
    • 996–997, Ælfric of Eynsham, “Saint Maur, Abbot”, in Rev. Walter W. Skeat, M.A., ed. and transl., Aelfric's Lives of Saints (Early English Text Society original series 76), volume I, London: N. Trübner & Co., published 1881, page 158:
      Þā ēode sē prēost eft tō his weorce.
      Then the priest went back to his work.
    • c. 990 CE, Matthew 26:52, in Benjamin Thorpe, F.S.A., ed. and transl., The Anglo-Saxon Version of the Holy Gospels, London: J.G.F. and J. Rivington; and J.H. Parker, published 1842, page 62:
      Þā cwæþ sē Hǣlend tō him, "Dō þīn sweord eft on his sċēaðe."
      Then Jesus said to him, "Put your sword back in its sheath."
  3. afterwards
    • c. 989–992 CE, Ælfric of Eynsham, edited and translated by Benjamin Thorpe, F.S.A., The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church, volume II, London: Richard and John E. Taylor, published 1846, page 192:
      Moyses, ðurh Godes mihte, āwende eal heora wæter tō rēadum blōde, and hē āfylde eal heora land mid froggon, and siððan mid gnættum, eft mid hundes lūsum, ðā flugon into heora mūðe and heora næsðyrlum; and sē Ælmihtiġa ðone mōdiġan cyning mid þām eaðelicum ġesċeaftum swā gėswencte...
      Moses, through the power of God, turned all their water into red blood, and filled all of their land with frogs, and then with gnats, and afterwards with dogflies, which flew into their mouths and their nostrils; the Almighty punished their proud king in that way with every kind of creature...

Synonyms

Derived terms

Descendants

Old Saxon

Etymology

From Proto-Germanic *afti. Cognate with Old Frisian eft, Old English eft, Old Norse ept.

Adverb

eft

  1. afterwards, again
    • 9th c. Heliand, verse 4898:
      hē suiltit imu eft swerdes eggiun
      he succumbed to death again by the sword's edge.

Yola

Etymology

From Middle English efte, from Old English efete.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ɛft/

Noun

eft

  1. newt

References

  • Jacob Poole (d. 1827) (before 1828), William Barnes, editor, A Glossary, With some Pieces of Verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, London: J. Russell Smith, published 1867, page 38
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