Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Water droplets condensed from the air, usually at night, onto cool surfaces.
  • noun Something moist, fresh, pure, or renewing.
  • noun Moisture, as in the form of tears or perspiration, that appears in small drops.
  • transitive verb To wet with or as if with dew.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To wet with or as if with dew; moisten; bedew.
  • An obsolete spelling of due.
  • noun The aqueous vapor which is deposited from the atmosphere by condensation, especially during the night, in the form of small drops on the surface of bodies.
  • noun Something likened to dew: As falling lightly, or as serving to refresh.
  • noun As suggestive of the morning, and hence of freshness and youth.
  • noun Moisture standing in little drops on anything.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To wet with dew or as with dew; to bedew; to moisten; as with dew.
  • obsolete Same as due, or duty.
  • noun Moisture from the atmosphere condensed by cool bodies upon their surfaces, particularly at night.
  • noun Figuratively, anything which falls lightly and in a refreshing manner.
  • noun An emblem of morning, or fresh vigor.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun uncountable moisture in the air that settles on plants, etc in the morning, resulting in drops.
  • noun countable an instance of a such moisture settling on plants, etc.
  • verb To wet with, or as if with, dew; to moisten.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun water that has condensed on a cool surface overnight from water vapor in the air

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English deu, from Old English dēaw; see dheu- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English, from Old English dēaw ("dew"), from Proto-Germanic *dawwaz, *dawwan (“dew, moisture”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰew- (“to run, flow”). Cognate with North Frisian dauw ("dew"), Dutch dauw ("dew"), German Tau ("dew"), Danish dug ("dew"), Swedish dagg ("dew"), Icelandic dögg ("dew") and Faroese døgg ("dew"), Ancient Greek θέω (théō, "run", v), Persian دویدن (davidan, "run", v), Albanian dejë ("spot where the snow thaws"), Sanskrit धावति (dhāvati, "run, flow, move").

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  • For etymological connection see sundog and fogdog.

    July 30, 2021