wander

From Middle English wandren, wandrien, from Old English wandrian (“to wander, roam, fly around, hover; change; stray, err”), from Proto-Germanic *wandrōną (“to wander”), from Proto-Indo-European *wendʰ- (“to turn, wind”), equivalent to wend +‎ -er (frequentative suffix). Cognate with Scots wander (“to wander”), German wandern (“to wander, roam, hike, migrate”), Swedish vandra (“to wander, hike”).

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈwɑndɚ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈwɒndə/

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• Rhymes: -ɒndə(ɹ)
• Hyphenation: wan‧der

wander (third-person singular simple present wanders, present participle wandering, simple past and past participle wandered)

1. (intransitive) To move without purpose or specified destination; often in search of livelihood.

   to wander over the fields

   • Bible, Hebrews xi.37:

     They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins.

   • 1907, Robert William Chambers, chapter IX, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326:

     “A tight little craft,” was Austin’s invariable comment on the matron; […]. ¶ Near her wandered her husband, orientally bland, invariably affable, and from time to time squinting sideways, as usual, in the ever-renewed expectation that he might catch a glimpse of his stiff, retroussé moustache.

   • 1915, G[eorge] A. Birmingham [pseudonym; James Owen Hannay], chapter I, in Gossamer, New York, N.Y.: George H. Doran Company, OCLC 5661828:

     There is an hour or two, after the passengers have embarked, which is disquieting and fussy. […] Stewards, carrying cabin trunks, swarm in the corridors. Passengers wander restlessly about or hurry, with futile energy, from place to place.

2. (intransitive) To stray; stray from one's course; err.

   A writer wanders from his subject.

   • Bible, Psalms cxix.10:

     O, let me not wander from thy commandments.

3. (intransitive) To commit adultery.
4. (intransitive) To go somewhere indirectly or at varying speeds; to move in a curved path.
5. (intransitive) Of the mind, to lose focus or clarity of argument or attention.

• (move without purpose): err, roam
• (commit adultery): cheat
• (go somewhere indirectly):
• (lose focus): drift

• bewander
• forwander
• inwander
• miswander
• wander off
• wanderer
• wanderlust
• wanderstar

wander (plural wanders)

1. The act or instance of wandering.

   To go for a wander

• polar wander

• Andrew, Darwen, Warden, drawne, warden, warned

wander

1. First-person singular present of wandern.
2. Imperative singular of wandern.