Etymologically
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bleed

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English bleden,[2][3][4] inherited from Old English blēdan,[5][6][7][8][9] inherited from Proto-Germanic *blōdijaną (“to bleed, emit blood”),[5][6][10][11] a verb formed from the Germanic noun *blōþą (“blood”), the source of blood.[5][12][8] The Old English verb shows the vowel mutation of blōd (“blood”).[13][4] It is cognate with Old Frisian blēda, Middle Low German blöden, Old Norse blæða, Dutch bloeden and German bluten.[10][6][8][11][9] Etymonline traces the Germanic family to Proto-Indo-European *bʰlo-to- (“swell, gush, spurt”), a suffixed form of *bʰel- (“to thrive, bloom”),[6][2] and Partridge thought blood perhaps akin to German Blume (“flower”), with the basic idea "florid".[14]

Earliest recorded meaning

To emit or lose blood: Old English, about 900 in Barnhart,[7][10] as in Blédaþ ǽdran, "the veins shall bleed", in Solomon and Saturn.[9][5] Etymonline gives the Old English verb also the transitive sense "to cause to lose blood, to let blood".[6]

Semantic evolution

From the literal sense the verb soon took figurative ones: the heart bleeds with anguish, sorrow or pity from Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde (about 1374),[5][6] and Barnhart dates the sense "to feel pity for" to minor poems of 1377.[10] From about 1300, in Havelok, it also meant to lose blood from severe wounds, to shed one's blood or die in battle.[5][15] In Middle English and after, the transitive verb meant especially to let blood surgically,[6] and Johnson (1755) defined it first as "to let blood; to take blood from".[16] The money senses come from that practice: to lose or part with money that is felt dates from 1671, in Dryden,[5] and "to extort money from" from the 1670s,[6] with a gamblers' example in Cotton's Compleat Gamester (1674).[17] Plants have bled sap since 1675,[5] and dyes or colours have bled into neighbouring areas since 1862.[5][6] The 20th century added the printing sense of a page or picture trimmed with no margin, recorded as a noun from 1900 in Merriam-Webster and 1939 in the OED,[3][5] and the engineering sense of drawing off liquid or gas from a system.[15][18] In northern English and Scots dialect, corn that bleeds well gives a good yield, and in Northumberland and Durham coal was said to bleed when water came through it.[19][5]

Timeline

  • c. 900 – Old English blēdan, to emit blood.[7][10]
  • c. 1300 – to lose blood from wounds; to die by bloodshed.[5]
  • c. 1305 – of blood, to flow or ooze out.[5]
  • c. 1374 – the heart bleeds, of anguish or pity.[5]
  • a. 1585 – noun, an act of bleeding.[5]
  • 1642 – of corn, to bleed well, give a good yield (dialect).[5]
  • 1671 – to part with money, to have money extorted.[5]
  • 1675 – of plants, to emit sap.[5]
  • 1862 – of dye or colour, to run into a neighbouring area.[5][6]
  • 1900 – noun, a page or illustration printed or trimmed with no margin.[3]
  • 1949 – noun, the drawing off of a fluid, or the valve through which it is drawn.[5]

Modern meaning

Verb

  1. To lose blood, as from a wound: His knee bled after the fall.
  2. To draw blood from a person or animal, especially (historical) as a medical treatment.
  3. To be wounded or die, as for a cause or a country.
  4. To feel anguish or sympathy: my heart bleeds for you, often ironic.
  5. Of a plant, to give out sap or resin, especially from a cut.
  6. (informal) To get large sums of money from someone, especially by extortion.
  7. bleed someone white: to drain someone of all their resources.
  8. To draw off liquid or gas from a closed system: The mechanic bled the brake lines.
  9. Of a dye or paint, to run or spread into an area nearby, especially when wet.

Noun

  1. An act or instance of bleeding.
  2. (printing) A page or picture that is printed or trimmed so as to leave no margin.

Word family

  • bleeder
  • nosebleed
  • bleeding heart

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  3. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  7. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  8. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  9. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  10. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  11. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  12. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  13. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  14. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
  15. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  17. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  18. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  19. ^ 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)