wish

From Middle English wisshen, wischen, wüschen, from Old English wȳsċan (“to wish”), from Proto-West Germanic *wunskijan, from Proto-Germanic *wunskijaną (“to wish”), from Proto-Indo-European *wenh₁- (“to wish, love”).

Cognate with Scots wis (“to wish”), Saterland Frisian wonskje (“to wish”), West Frisian winskje (“to wish”), Dutch wensen (“to wish”), German wünschen (“to wish”), Danish ønske (“to wish”), Icelandic æskja, óska (“to wish”), Latin Venus, veneror (“venerate, honour, love”).

• enPR: wĭsh, IPA^(key): /wɪʃ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪʃ
• Homophone: whish (in accents with the wine-whine merger)

wish (plural wishes)

1. A desire, hope, or longing for something or for something to happen.

   have a wish

   make someone's wish come true

   • 2010, BioWare, Mass Effect 2 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU!:

     Send this message to six beings of your acquaintance, and your greatest wish shall come true!

2. An expression of such a desire, often connected with ideas of magic and supernatural power.

   make a wish

   • 2004, George Carlin, When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?‎, New York: Hyperion Books, →ISBN, →OCLC, →OL, page 237:

     LESTER: You believe in wishes? I mean, you believe they come true?
     CHESTER: Nah. I believe in wishes, but I don't believe they come true. Not unless it's a real easy wish, like "I wish I was at a birthday party." But you gotta blow out all the candles, or else the wish don't come true. If one candle stays lit, you don't get your wish.

3. The thing desired or longed for.

   My dearest wish is to see them happily married.

   • 1901, W. W. Jacobs, The Monkey's Paw:

     "I suppose all old soldiers are the same," said Mrs White. "The idea of our listening to such nonsense! How could wishes be granted in these days? And if they could, how could two hundred pounds hurt you, father?" / "Might drop on his head from the sky," said the frivolous Herbert.

4. (Sussex) A water meadow.

• precatory
• velleity

wish (third-person singular simple present wishes, present participle wishing, simple past and past participle wished)

1. (transitive) To desire; to want.

   I'll come tomorrow, if you wish it.

   • 2018 May 13, Justin King, “How to Fix the Storylines of Film and Television”, in Return of Kings:

     Showing the population what we wish them to be is the best way for them to change.

   • 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i]:

     I would not wish / Any companion in the world but you.

   • 1716, Jonathan Swift, Phyllis, or the Progress of Love:

     Now John the butler must be sent
     To learn the road that Phyllis went:
     The groom was wished to saddle Crop;
     For John must neither light nor stop,
     But find her, wheresoe'er she fled,
     And bring her back alive or dead.

   • 1899, Hughes Mearns, Antigonish:

     Yesterday, upon the stair / I met a man who wasn’t there / He wasn’t there again today / I wish, I wish he’d go away …

2. (transitive, now rare) To hope (+ object clause with may or in present subjunctive).
   • 1748, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter LXXXIV”, in Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to VII), London: […] S[amuel] Richardson;  […], →OCLC:

     I wish he mean me well, that he takes so much pains!

   • 1808, Jane Austen, letter, 1 October:

     She hears that Miss Bigg is to be married in a fortnight. I wish it may be so.

3. (intransitive, followed by for) To hope (for a particular outcome), even if that outcome is unlikely to occur or cannot occur.
   • 1727, John Arbuthnot, Tables of Ancient Coins, Weights and Measures:

     This is as good an argument as an antiquary could wish for.

   • 1901, W. W. Jacobs, The Monkey's Paw:

     Mr. White took the paw from his pocket and eyed it dubiously. "I don't know what to wish for, and that's a fact," he said slowly. "It seems to me I've got all I want."

   I wish I could go back in time and teach myself what I know now.

4. (ditransitive) To bestow (a thought or gesture) towards (someone or something).

   We wish you a Merry Christmas.

   • c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene viii]:

     I would not wish them to a fairer death.

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 40:14:

     Let them be driven backward, and put to shame, that wish me evil.

5. (intransitive, followed by to and an infinitive) To request or desire to do an activity.
   • 2013 July-August, Henry Petroski, “Geothermal Energy”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4:

     Energy has seldom been found where we need it when we want it. Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame. With more settled people, animals were harnessed to capstans or caged in treadmills to turn grist into meal.

6. (transitive) To recommend; to seek confidence or favour on behalf of.
   • 1610 (first performance), Ben[jamin] Jonson, The Alchemist, London: […] Thomas Snodham, for Walter Burre, and are to be sold by Iohn Stepneth, […], published 1612, →OCLC; reprinted Menston, Yorkshire: The Scolar Press, 1970, →OCLC, (please specify the GB page), (please specify the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):

     I was wished to your worship by a gentleman.

   • c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:

     Farewell: yet for the loue I beare my sweet Bianca, if I can by any meanes light on a fit man to teach her that wherein she delights, I will wish him to her father.

• In sense 4, this is a catenative verb that takes the to infinitive. See Appendix:English catenative verbs

• “wish”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “wish”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

From Middle English vish, from Old English fisċ, from Proto-West Germanic *fisk.

• IPA^(key): /wɪʃ/

wish

1. fish

• Jacob Poole (d. 1827) (before 1828) William Barnes, editor, A Glossary, With some Pieces of Verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, London: J. Russell Smith, published 1867, page 78