muse

See also: Muse, musé, musė, muše, and Muße

English

WOTD – 27 February 2008

Pronunciation

  • enPR: myo͞oz
    • (UK) IPA(key): /mjuːz/
    • (US) IPA(key): /mjuz/
    • (file)
  • (file)
  • Homophones: mews, Meuse
  • Rhymes: -uːz

Etymology 1

From Middle French muse, from Latin Mūsa, from Ancient Greek Μοῦσα (Moûsa).

Noun

muse (plural muses)

  1. (of people) A source of inspiration.
    Yoko Ono was John Lennon's wife, lover, and muse.
  2. (archaic) A poet; a bard.
Synonyms
Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English musen, from Old French muser.

Verb

muse (third-person singular simple present muses, present participle musing, simple past and past participle mused)

  1. (intransitive) To become lost in thought, to ponder.
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:ponder
  2. (transitive) To say (something) with due consideration or thought.
    • For quotations using this term, see Citations:muse.
  3. (transitive) To think on; to meditate on.
    • c. 1726, James Thomson, Hymn:
      Come, then, expressive Silence, muse his praise.
    • 2013 June 7, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 36:
      It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: […];  […]; or perhaps to muse on the irrelevance of the borders that separate nation states and keep people from understanding their shared environment.
  4. (transitive) To wonder at.
Translations

Noun

muse (plural muses)

  1. An act of musing; a period of thoughtfulness.

Etymology 3

From French musse. See muset.

Noun

muse (plural muses)

  1. A gap or hole in a hedge, fence, etc. through which a wild animal is accustomed to pass; a muset.
    Find a hare without a muse. (old proverb)

Anagrams

French

Pronunciation

Noun

muse f (plural muses)

  1. artistic inspiration
  2. muse (specific artistic subject)

Verb

muse

  1. inflection of muser:
    1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
    2. second-person singular imperative

Further reading

Anagrams

Italian

Noun

muse f

  1. plural of musa

Anagrams

Middle English

Noun

muse

  1. Alternative form of mous

Noun

muse

  1. Alternative form of Muse

Verb

muse

  1. Alternative form of musen

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From French musée, from Latin mūsēum, from Ancient Greek Μουσεῖον (Mouseîon).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /mʉ.seː/, [mʉʷ.ˈseː]

Noun

muse n (definite singular museet, indefinite plural muse or museer, definite plural museene or musea)

  1. Alternative form of musé

References

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology 1

From Ancient Greek Μοῦσα (Moûsa).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /²mʉː.sə/

Noun

muse f (definite singular musa, indefinite plural muser, definite plural musene)

  1. a muse

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /²mʉː.sə/

Verb

muse (present tense musar, past tense musa, past participle musa, passive infinitive musast, present participle musande, imperative muse/mus)

  1. to whisper
    Synonym: kviskre

Etymology 3

From French musée, from Latin mūsēum, from Ancient Greek Μουσεῖον (Mouseîon).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /mʉ.seː/, [mʉʷ.ˈseː]

Noun

muse n (definite singular museet, indefinite plural muse, definite plural musea)

  1. alternative spelling of musé

References

Spanish

Verb

muse

  1. only used in se muse, third-person singular present indicative of musirse
  2. only used in te ... muse, syntactic variant of músete, second-person singular imperative of musirse
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