English
dwarf
see also: DWARF
Etymology

From Middle English dwergh, dwerw, dwerf, from Old English dweorg, from Proto-West Germanic *dwerg, from Proto-Germanic *dwergaz.

Cognate with Scots dwerch; Old High German twerc (German Zwerg); Old Norse dvergr (Swedish dvärg); ofs dwirg (Western Frisian dwerch); Middle Low German dwerch, dwarch, twerg (nds-de Dwarg, Dwarch); Middle Dutch dwerch, dworch (Dutch dwerg).

The Modern English noun has undergone complex phonetic changes. The form dwarf is the regular continuation of Old English dweorg, but the plural dweorgas would have given rise to dwarrows and the oblique stem dweorge- would have led to dwery. These forms are sometimes found as the nominative singular in Middle English texts and in English dialects. A parallel case is that of Old English burg giving burgh, borough, burrow, bury.

Pronunciation Noun

dwarf (plural dwarfs)

  1. (mythology) Any member of a race of beings from (especially Scandinavian and other Germanic) folklore, usually depicted as having some sort of supernatural powers and being skilled in crafting and metalworking, often as short with long beards, and sometimes as clashing with elves.
  2. (now, sometimes offensive) A person of short stature, often one whose limbs are disproportionately small in relation to the body as compared with typical adults, usually as the result of a genetic condition.
    Synonyms: midget, pygmy (imprecise)
    Antonyms: ettin, giant
  3. An animal, plant or other thing much smaller than the usual of its sort.
    Synonyms: runt
    dwarf tree
    dwarf honeysuckle
  4. (star) A dwarf star.
Translations Translations Translations Translations Adjective

dwarf (comparative dwarfer, superlative dwarfest)

  1. (especially in botany) Miniature.
    The specimen is a very dwarf form of the plant.
    It is possible to grow the plants as dwarf as one desires.
Translations Verb

dwarf (dwarfs, present participle dwarfing; simple past and past participle dwarfed)

  1. (transitive) To render (much) smaller, turn into a dwarf (version).
    Synonyms: miniaturize, shrink
  2. (transitive) To make appear (much) smaller, puny, tiny.
    The newly-built skyscraper dwarfs all older buildings in the downtown skyline.
  3. (transitive) To make appear insignificant.
    Synonyms: eclipse, overshadow, outshadow, outshine, outdo, put to shame, upstage, surpass, outmatch, outstrip
    Bach dwarfs all other composers.
  4. (intransitive) To become (much) smaller.
    Synonyms: shrink
  5. To hinder from growing to the natural size; to make or keep small; to stunt.
    • 1710 July 3 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison], “THURSDAY, June 22, 1710”, in The Spectator, number 98; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume II, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC ↗:
      At present the whole sex is in a manner dwarfed and shrunk - into a race of beauties that seems almost another species
      The spelling has been modernized.
    • 1881, John Campbell Shairp, Aspects of Poetry:
      Even the most common moral ideas and affections […] would be stunted and dwarfed, if cut off from a spiritual background.
Translations Translations Translations Translations
DWARF
Etymology

A play on the related ELF object file format. The backronym “Debugging With Arbitrary Record Formats” has been suggested.

Proper noun
  1. (file format) A standardized debugging file format.


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