yonder - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From Middle English yonder, yondre, ȝondre, ȝendre, from Old English ġeonre (“thither; yonder”, adverb), equivalent to yond (from ġeond, from Proto-Germanic *jainaz) + -er, as in hither, thither.
Cognate with Scots ȝondir (“yonder”), Saterland Frisian tjunder (“over there, yonder”), Dutch ginder (“over there; yonder”), Middle Low German ginder, gender (“over there”), German jenseits (“on the other side, beyond”),[1] Gothic 𐌾𐌰𐌹𐌽𐌳𐍂𐌴 (jaindrē, “thither”).[2]

yonder (not comparable)

  1. (archaic or dialectal outside of Cumbria, Southern US) At or in a distant but indicated place.
  2. (archaic or dialect) Synonym of thither: to a distant but indicated place.

in a distant, indicated place

yonder (comparative more yonder, superlative most yonder)

  1. (archaic or dialect) The farther, the more distant of two choices.

yonder

  1. (archaic or dialect, as an adjective) Who or which is over yonder, usually distant but within sight.
    Yonder lass, who be she?
  2. (archaic or dialect, as a pronoun) One who or which is over yonder, usually distant but within sight.
    The yonder is Queen Niobe.

distant but within sight

yonder (plural yonders)

  1. (literary) The vast distance, particularly the sky or trackless forest.
    She set off into the blue yonder.
  1. ^ https://www.dwds.de/wb/dwb/jener
  2. ^ yonder, adv., adj., pron., & n.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1921.
  3. ^ Stanley, Oma (1937), “I. Vowel Sounds in Stressed Syllables”, in The Speech of East Texas (American Speech: Reprints and Monographs; 2), New York: Columbia University Press, →DOI, →ISBN, § 7, page 18.
  4. 4.0 4.1 Kurath, Hans; McDavid, Raven I., Jr. (1961), The pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States: based upon the collections of the linguistic atlas of the Eastern United States‎[1], Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, § 5.4, page 143:
    The /ɑ ~ ɒ/ of lot is the usual vowel in yonder, but a variety of other vowels have some currency, mostly in folk speech: in the North and the North Midland, the /ʌ/ of sun and the /ɛ/ of ten; in parts of the South and the South Midland, the /æ/ of man. See Map 82. It is not clear without further investigation whether South Carolina and Georgia have /ə/ beside /ɑ/ in yonder.
  5. ^ Bingham, Caleb (1808), “Improprieties in Pronunciation, common among the people of New-England”, in The Child's Companion; Being a Conciſe Spelling-book […] ‎[2], 12th edition, Boston: Manning & Loring, →OCLC, page 77.