blaze

English has three distinct words spelled blaze.^[1]

Pronunciation

• /bleɪz/^[2]

blaze¹ flame, bright fire

Etymology

The flame is inherited from Middle English blase, also blēse,^[3] inherited from Old English blæse (“torch, firebrand; flame”), also blase, a weak feminine noun,^{[4][5][6][7][8][9]} inherited from Proto-Germanic *blasǭ (“torch”).^{[2][10][6][9][1]} The Middle English Dictionary explains the northern form with ē as a blend with blēst, a variant of blast,^[3] while the OED takes it as a lengthening of the vowel of the Old English word.^[4] It is cognate with Middle High German blas (“torch, candle, fire”),^{[4][6][11][12]} Old Saxon blas (“white, whitish”) and Old High German blasros (“horse with a white spot”),^[5][8] and with German blass (“pale”), which originally meant "shining".^[4][5][8] Through this sense of shining it is related to blaze³, the white mark.^{[9][11][4][1]} Barnhart and Klein derive the Germanic word from Proto-Indo-European *bʰles- (“to shine”), an enlargement of *bʰel- (“to shine, flash, burn”),^[6][8][5] and Klein compares blysa (“torch, flame”) and blyscan (“to blush”).^[8] The verb, to burn brightly, was formed in Middle English from the noun, as blāsen;^[3][4][6] the OED notes that no corresponding verb exists in Old English or any other Germanic language.^[4][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

A torch or firebrand: before 893, in Werferth's translation of the Dialogues of Gregory the Great, where it renders Latin fax (“torch”).^[6][7] The OED records this sense from Old English to 1600, and the sense "bright flame or fire" also from Old English, in Guthlac A.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Ayto notes that although the word first meant a torch, a burning piece of wood or bunch of sticks, its main modern meaning of flame was established by the year 1000.^[1] Johnson (1755) remarked that "blaze implies more the light than the heat".^[13] The verb appears about 1225 in the Ancrene Riwle, both for burning with a bright flame and for a person burning with passion or anger;^[4][3] from 1393, in Langland, it also meant to shine brightly, and since Trevisa (before 1387) to be conspicuous through splendour or renown.^[4] The noun followed with "glory, splendour" (1578, in Lyly's Euphues), "brilliant light" (1586), a sudden outburst of passion (1597, in Shakespeare's Richard II) and the full light of noon (1747).^[4] To blaze away, to fire guns continuously, is recorded from 1776, and hence to work with enthusiasm.^[5][4] In the plural, blazes has since 1818 referred to the flames of hell, in slang expressions such as like blazes and go to blazes;^[4][11][12] the blazer, a brightly coloured jacket, was named in the 19th century among English university students.^[1][9] Scots and Irish dialect had to put one's beard in a blaze, to fly into a rage.^[14] Since 1985 the verb has also meant, in slang, to smoke marijuana.^[4][15]

Timeline

• before 893 – a torch, firebrand (obsolete by 1600).^[6][4]
• Old English – a bright flame or fire.^[4]
• probably before 1200 – Middle English blase, in Layamon.^[6]
• c. 1225 – verb, to burn brightly; to burn with passion.^[4][3]
• before 1387 – verb, to be conspicuous through splendour.^[4]
• 1393 – verb, to shine brightly.^[4]
• 1578 – noun, glory, splendour.^[4]
• 1586 – noun, brilliant light.^[4]
• 1597 – noun, an outburst of passion.^[4]
• 1776 – blaze away, to fire continuously.^[5][4]
• 1818 – blazes, the flames of hell.^[4]
• 1985 – verb, slang, to smoke marijuana.^[4]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A strong, bright fire or flame, especially one that spreads quickly: Firefighters fought the warehouse blaze all night.
2. A very bright light or glare: the blaze of the stage lights.
3. A sudden outburst of feeling: a blaze of fury.
4. A brilliant display; splendour: in a blaze of glory.
5. blazes (slang) hell, in phrases such as go to blazes and like blazes.

Verb

1. To burn fiercely with a bright flame.
2. To shine brightly: The windows blazed with light.
3. To show strong feeling, especially to flare up with anger.
4. blaze away: to shoot continuously.
5. (slang) To smoke marijuana.

Word family

• blazer
• blazingly
• ablaze
• outblaze
• emblaze

blaze² proclaim

Etymology

The verb meaning to proclaim is inherited from Middle English blāsen (“to blow”),^[3][16] probably borrowed from Middle Dutch blāsen (“to blow”),^{[16][6][1][17][9][11]} which matches Old Norse blása (“to blow”),^[4][6][9] Old High German blāsan, blasen in modern German, and Gothic 𐌿𐍆𐌱𐌻𐌴𐍃𐌰𐌽 (ufblēsan, “to blow up, puff up”),^[4][9][11] from Proto-Germanic *blēsaną (“to blow”).^[2][18][19] The OED thinks the Middle English verb more likely came from the Norse verb, unless a direct link with Dutch or Low German can be traced,^[4] and Klein also derives it from Old Norse.^[8] The Germanic verb was not kept in Old English, which had only the derived noun blǣst, the source of blast,^[4][6] and it is an extension of the root of blow.^{[9][11][6][1]} Kroonen derives it from Proto-Indo-European *bʰléh₁-s-e-,^[18] and Etymonline, after Watkins, from *bʰleh₁- (“to blow”);^[5] the OED and Weekley compare Latin flō (“to blow”).^[4][12] Etymonline also allows a link with blaze¹, in the notion of shining forth.^[5] From the 16th century its senses were confused with those of blazon, through the likeness of the infinitive to the noun blason (“shield”),^[4] though Ayto finds no real connection between the words.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

To blow, as on a trumpet: about 1384, in Chaucer's House of Fame, where Aeolus "with his blake clarioun... gan to blasen out a soun".^[4][3][6] This sense was obsolete by 1535.^[4]

Semantic evolution

From blowing a trumpet the verb passed to proclaiming, as a herald does with a trumpet, and to publishing or making known (about 1450, in the Testament of Love);^[4][12][16] with abroad, the commonest use, it is recorded from 1552.^[4][11] The OED adds that later uses were often coloured by blaze¹, as if to blaze something abroad were to expose it to the full light of publicity.^[4][6] In the 16th century, mixed with blazon, it also meant to describe a coat of arms (from about 1440, in the Promptorium Parvulorum, to 1628), to celebrate or set forth (1566–1635) and to depict (1579–1641);^[4][3] in 1579 it could also mean to defame.^[4] Ayto calls the word now seldom met with.^[1] In Scots and northern English dialect it was still used in the 19th century for spreading news or scandal, and for slandering someone.^[14]

Timeline

• c. 1384 – to blow, as a trumpet (obsolete by 1535).^[4][6]
• c. 1440 – to describe in heraldic terms, to blazon (obsolete by 1628).^[4][3]
• c. 1450 – to proclaim, publish, make known.^[4]
• 1552 – blaze abroad.^[4]
• 1579 – to defame (obsolete).^[4]

Modern meaning

Verb

1. To make widely known; to proclaim, often with abroad: They blazed the rumour abroad through the whole town.
2. (obsolete) To blazon.

blaze³ white mark; mark on a tree

Etymology

The white mark is of uncertain origin.^{[4][6][11][9]} It first appears in the 17th century, with no Old or Middle English form, but has the same meaning as words in Old Norse, Dutch, Middle Dutch blesse and German Blässe.^[4][11][9] It may be borrowed from Old Norse blesi (“white mark on a horse's forehead”), taken first into northern English dialect and later into general use,^[4][6][5] or Dutch bles or Middle Low German bles, brought in as a technical term about 1600;^[4][12][2] Ayto thinks the Low German word the likeliest source,^[1] Klein blase, as in blasenhengst (“horse with a blaze”),^[8] while Merriam-Webster names Middle High German blas.^[16] Barnhart also allows blasse (“white spot on an animal's forehead”).^[6] The OED notes that a borrowing from Norse would be expected to sound like the northern form of the flame word, which the literary language also spells blaze, while from Dutch or Low German the spelling would simply follow the sound.^[4] All these words go back to Proto-Germanic *blasį̄, from *blasaz (“white, pale (of animals)”),^[2] and are related to the Middle High German word in its sense "bald", to the noun blaze¹ through the sense of shining,^{[5][1][9][20]} and to bald.^[16][6] The verb, to mark a tree or trail, is formed from the noun.^{[4][5][6][11]}

Earliest recorded meaning

A white spot on the face of a horse or ox: 1639, in Thomas de Gray's Compleat Horseman.^[4][6][16] Etymonline dates it to the 1630s.^[5]

Semantic evolution

In America the word was transferred by 1662, in the early records of Groton, Massachusetts, to a white mark made on a tree by chipping off a piece of bark, to show a path or a boundary in a forest.^[4][6][20] The verb, to mark trees in this way, followed in 1750, in Thomas Walker's journal of exploration,^[4][5][6] and soon also meant to mark out a path; to blaze a trail or blaze the way is to show the way for others, literally or figuratively,^[11][16] the source of trailblazer.^[16] Weekley suggested that the American tree sense might be an independent borrowing from Dutch.^[12] In Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Berkshire dialect the noun was used of a horse's white face mark in the proverb "If the mare has a bald face, the filly will have a blaze".^[14] American campus slang has used blaze, from blazing the trail, for "to leave" since the 1950s.^[15]

Timeline

• 1639 – a white mark on the face of a horse or ox.^[4][6]
• 1662 – a mark made on a tree by cutting off bark, in America.^[4][6]
• 1750 – verb, to mark a tree or a path in this way.^[4][5][6]
• 1954 – slang, to leave.^[15]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A white mark on the face of a horse, cow or other animal, especially a stripe running down the face.
2. A mark made on a tree, usually by cutting off a piece of bark, to show a trail or boundary.
3. A white or grey streak in a person's hair.
4. A facial pattern in some cats, in which two colours meet along a line down the nose.

Verb

1. To mark a tree by cutting off a piece of its bark.
2. To mark out a path with such marks: The rangers blazed a route across the ridge.
3. blaze a trail: to lead the way or be a pioneer in some activity.

Word family

• trailblazer

Related words

• blazing star
• blast
• blow
• blazon
• bald
• blush
• blemish

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
2. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
7. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
8. ^ a b c d e f g Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
11. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b c d e f Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
15. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
16. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
17. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
18. ^ a b Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
19. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
20. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press