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Etymology and origin of the English word veer

Pronunciation

  • UK: /vɪə̯/[1]
  • US: /vɪ(ə)ɹ/[1]

veer1 to let out (a rope)

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
c. 1460 Pilgrim's Sea-voyage
Borrowed from
Middle Dutch vieren via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Middle Dutch vieren

Etymology

The word for letting out a rope is inherited from Middle English veren,[2][3] borrowed from Middle Dutch vieren (“to let out, slacken”),[4][5][6][7][8] and perhaps also borrowed from Middle Low German vīren (“to slacken”).[3][2][9] The Dutch verb is related to Old High German fiaren (“to give direction to”),[4][5][3][7] and as a nautical term it also passed into German fieren, Danish fire and Swedish fira.[4][7] Klein connects it with Germanic words for "side" or "bank": fiara (“side”), Gothic 𐍆𐌴𐍂𐌰 (fēra, “side”), Old English ōfer (“edge, bank, shore”), Dutch oever and German Ufer;[7] Merriam-Webster Unabridged thinks it probably related to Old English feorr, the source of far.[3] Weekley quotes the Dutch phrase den schoot vieren (“to veer the sheets”).[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

To let out a sheet or other sail-line: about 1460, in the Pilgrim's Sea-voyage.[4] The Middle English Dictionary's first quotation, "vere the shete", is from about 1500,[2] and Etymonline also dates the Middle English verb to about 1500.[9]

Semantic evolution

The verb stayed a sailors' word.[5][6] From the sail-line it spread to letting a boat or buoy drift further off on its line (1539), to letting out any line or rope gradually (1574) and to paying out a cable (1604), its main use today, often with out or away.[4][5][6] Johnson (1755) gave "to let out" as its first sense, quoting Ben Jonson on veering out all sail.[11] In the 17th century it was also used of a ship sailing with its sheet let out.[4][5] The phrase to veer and haul, to pay out and haul in a cable by turns for extra pull, is recorded from 1769.[4][5]

Timeline

  • c. 1460 – to let a sheet or sail-line run out.[4]
  • 1539 – to let a boat or buoy drift further off by letting out its line.[4][5]
  • 1574 – to let out any line or rope gradually.[4]
  • 1604 – to pay out a cable.[4][6]
  • before 1625 – of a ship, to sail with the sheet let out (obsolete by 1692).[4]
  • 1769 – to veer and haul, to pay out and haul in a cable alternately.[4][5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (nautical) To let out or pay out a rope, cable or anchor chain gradually, often with out: The crew veered out more cable as the wind rose.[3][5][4][12]
  2. (nautical) To let a boat or buoy drift further off by slackening the line attached to it.[4][5]

veer2 to change direction

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1582 N. Lichefield's translation of Castanheda
Borrowed from
Middle French virer

Etymology

The word for changing direction is borrowed from Middle French virer (“to turn”),[13][3][14] from Old French virer, recorded from the 12th century,[9][10] which corresponds to Spanish virar, Portuguese virar and Italian virare.[4][5] The French verb is of uncertain origin.[4][9][13] Diez derived it from the Latin stem seen in viriae (“bracelets”),[9][13][15] a view Klein reports Meyer-Lübke rejected.[7] Hoad, the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English take it from Vulgar Latin *vīrō, perhaps an alteration of Latin gȳrō (“to turn round”), the source of gyrate,[6][5][16] by association with vertō (“to turn”) or vibrō (“to shake”);[6] Merriam-Webster's Collegiate and Klein take the Vulgar Latin verb as an alteration of the last of these,[14][7] a derivation that Etymonline reports Gamillscheg thought impossible.[9] Merriam-Webster Unabridged and Collins instead think the French verb probably Celtic, comparing Welsh gwyro (“to shift, deviate”), Breton goara (“to curve”) and Old Irish fiar (“slanting”),[3][17] and Barnhart considers a link with Latin vieō (“to bend, plait”) and with wire.[13] The French verb is also the source of environ.[18][15][10] Merriam-Webster takes the English verb from a Middle English verb,[3][14] and the Middle English Dictionary records vēren, probably from Old French virer, from about 1400, for raising one's visor and, about 1450, of a ship veering wildly;[2] the OED and Etymonline date the modern verb from 1582.[4][9][13] Weekley thought the English spelling was altered after the nautical verb for letting out a rope.[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of the wind, to change gradually from one point to another: 1582, in Nicholas Lichefield's translation of Castanheda's history of the conquest of the East Indies.[4][13] Etymonline also gives the 1580s, with the wind as the earliest use,[9] and Dictionary.com 1575–85.[19]

Semantic evolution

The verb began as a sailors' word for the wind,[4][9] and it is still used for a wind that shifts clockwise, as from north to northeast, or, at sea, to a direction nearer the stern.[5][12][17] From the early 17th century it was used of a ship changing course, especially by turning its head away from the wind to sail on another tack,[4][9][5] a use the Shorter Oxford calls now rare in technical language, replaced by wear;[5] Partridge took wear in this sense as a corruption of veer.[18] From the 1630s it was used of anything turning from one course to another.[4] Dryden used it in the 1670s figuratively of people, feelings and conditions passing from one state to another.[4] Johnson (1755) gave "to turn about" for the intransitive verb, quoting Milton and Dryden.[11] The noun, a change of direction, is recorded from 1611 in Cotgrave's dictionary;[4][13] in American football a veer has been an option play since 1968.[4][5] In Wiltshire dialect veer weather was choppy, changeable weather.[20]

Timeline

  • 1582 – of the wind, to change gradually from one point to another.[4][13]
  • 1605 – to turn round, revolve (obsolete by 1611).[4]
  • 1611 – noun, a change of direction.[4][13]
  • 1610s – of a ship, to change course by turning away from the wind.[9] The OED's first quotations are from 1625 and before 1653.[4]
  • 1633 – of things, to turn from one direction or course to another.[4]
  • 1670 – figuratively, of feelings and conditions, to change; of persons from 1672.[4]
  • 1769 – of persons or animals, to turn aside.[4]
  • 1968 – noun, an option play in American football.[4][5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To change direction suddenly; to swerve or turn aside: The cyclist veered into the hedge.[3][12][5][17]
  2. To change from one opinion, mood or course to another: The debate veered between anger and laughter.[17][3][5]
  3. Of the wind: to shift clockwise, as from north to northeast, or at sea to blow from a direction nearer the stern.[12][17][5]
  4. (nautical) To turn a ship with its stern to the wind; to wear ship.[12][17][5]
  5. To turn something from one course or direction to another.[5][12][4]

Noun

  1. A change of course or direction: a sudden veer to the right.[3][17][12][4]
  2. (American football) An option play from a split backfield.[4][5]

Word family

  • veeringly

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d 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)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  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 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 o p q r s t u v w Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  10. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  11. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  13. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  14. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  15. ^ a b Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  16. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  17. ^ a b c d e f g Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  18. ^ a b Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
  19. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  20. ^ 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)

Related etymologies

  • brake · also from Middle Low German
  • utter · also from Middle Low German
  • tub · also from Middle Low German
  • hawk · also from Middle Low German
  • stove · also from Middle Low German
  • scrub · also from Middle Low German
  • damp · also from Middle Low German
  • wig · also from Middle Low German
Cite this entry

“Veer.” Etymologically, 8 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/veer. Accessed 9 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·