Library / English Dictionary

WANE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

A gradual decline (in size or strength or power or number)

Synonyms:

ebb; ebbing; wane

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural processes

Hypernyms ("wane" is a kind of...):

decline; diminution (change toward something smaller or lower)

Derivation:

wane (grow smaller)

wane (decrease in phase)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Grow smaller

Example:

Interest in the project waned

Synonyms:

decline; go down; wane

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Hypernyms (to "wane" is one way to...):

decrease; diminish; fall; lessen (decrease in size, extent, or range)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "wane"):

dip (go down momentarily)

wear on (pass slowly (of time))

drop (go down in value)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Derivation:

wane (a gradual decline (in size or strength or power or number))

waning (a gradual decrease in magnitude or extent)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Decrease in phase

Example:

the moon is waning

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Hypernyms (to "wane" is one way to...):

decrease; diminish; fall; lessen (decrease in size, extent, or range)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Sentence example:

The moon will soon wane

Antonym:

wax (increase in phase)

Derivation:

wane (a gradual decline (in size or strength or power or number))

waning (a gradual decrease in magnitude or extent)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Become smaller

Example:

Interest in his novels waned

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Hypernyms (to "wane" is one way to...):

decrease; diminish; fall; lessen (decrease in size, extent, or range)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Antonym:

wax (go up or advance)

Derivation:

waning (a gradual decrease in magnitude or extent)

Credits

 Context examples: 

When they went away together, in the waning moonlight, and I looked after them, comparing their departure in my mind with Martha's, I saw that she held his arm with both her hands, and still kept close to him.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

The results contradict some earlier studies, which had suggested that more water was detected at the Moon’s polar latitudes and that the strength of the water signal waxes and wanes according to the lunar day (29.5 Earth days).

(On Second Thought, the Moon's Water May Be Widespread and Immobile, NASA)

The afternoon came on wet and somewhat misty: as it waned into dusk, I began to feel that we were getting very far indeed from Gateshead: we ceased to pass through towns; the country changed; great grey hills heaved up round the horizon: as twilight deepened, we descended a valley, dark with wood, and long after night had overclouded the prospect, I heard a wild wind rushing amongst trees.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Yet summer lingered, fading and fainting among her hills, deepening the purple of her valleys, spinning a shroud of haze from waning powers and sated raptures, dying with the calm content of having lived and lived well.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

This resolution of mine was not due to any lack of material, since I have notes of many hundreds of cases to which I have never alluded, nor was it caused by any waning interest on the part of my readers in the singular personality and unique methods of this remarkable man.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

She drew his head down to hers as she spoke, and there, with their cheeks together, were the two faces, the one stamped with the waning beauty of womanhood, the other with the waxing strength of man, and yet so alike in the dark eyes, the blue-black hair and the broad white brow, that I marvelled that I had never read her secret on the first days that I had seen them together.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I must see the light of the unsnuffed candle wane on my employment; the shadows darken on the wrought, antique tapestry round me, and grow black under the hangings of the vast old bed, and quiver strangely over the doors of a great cabinet opposite—whose front, divided into twelve panels, bore, in grim design, the heads of the twelve apostles, each enclosed in its separate panel as in a frame; while above them at the top rose an ebon crucifix and a dying Christ.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

The rest of the half-year is a jumble in my recollection of the daily strife and struggle of our lives; of the waning summer and the changing season; of the frosty mornings when we were rung out of bed, and the cold, cold smell of the dark nights when we were rung into bed again; of the evening schoolroom dimly lighted and indifferently warmed, and the morning schoolroom which was nothing but a great shivering-machine; of the alternation of boiled beef with roast beef, and boiled mutton with roast mutton; of clods of bread-and-butter, dog's-eared lesson-books, cracked slates, tear-blotted copy-books, canings, rulerings, hair-cuttings, rainy Sundays, suet-puddings, and a dirty atmosphere of ink, surrounding all.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)