welch
See also: Welch and welch'
English
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /wɛlt͡ʃ/
Audio (Southern England) (file) - Rhymes: -ɛltʃ
Noun
welch (plural welches)
- A person who defaults on an obligation, especially a small one.
- She's a welch. That watering-can isn't hers: I lent it to her three years ago.
Verb
welch (third-person singular simple present welches, present participle welching, simple past and past participle welched)
- To fail to repay a small debt.
- To fail to fulfill an obligation.
- 1992, Bo Goldman, Scent of a Woman (film)
- I welched. I'm a welcher. Didn't I tell you?
- 1973, Mario Puzo, Francis Ford Coppola, The Godfather Part II (screenplay, second draft)
- MICHAEL: Clemenza promised Rosato three territories in the Bronx after he died, and then you took over and welched.
- 1992, Bo Goldman, Scent of a Woman (film)
Derived terms
Translations
fail to fulfill an obligation
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German
Alternative forms
- welch'
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /vɛlç/
Audio (file)
Determiner
welch
- (only preceding ein or an adjective, emphatic) what
- Welch ein Glück! ― How fortunate! (literally, “What a luck!”)
- 1911, Erwin Rosen [pseudonym; Erwin Carlé], Der Deutsche Lausbub in Amerika [The German prankster in America], page 255:
- Welch' ein Esel Bruder Leichtfuß doch war—welch' ein unbeschreiblich törichter dickköpfiger Junge!
- (please add an English translation of this quotation)
- 1956, Ernst Bloch, Das Prinzip Hoffnung, volume 3, Berlin: Aufbau-Verlag, page 304:
- In der Tat, welch ein Weg, welch ein Vergessen und Aufhellen von dem unheimlichen eulenartigen Wesen, das ums Erechtheion geistert, bis zur Pallas Athene Homers.
- (please add an English translation of this quotation)
Usage notes
- Many speakers consider welch very formal or poetic and may use was für instead.
Synonyms
Related terms
Further reading
- “welch ein” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
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