Pa. t. froze. Pa. pple. frozen. Forms: Infin. 1 fréosan, 3–4 fr(e)osen, 4–6 fre(e)se(n, frise, (5 freys, 6 freis, freze), 6, 8 frieze, 7–8 freez, (7 freize), 6 freeze. Pa. t. 1 fréas, 4 fre(e)s(e, 5 frore, frose, (9 dial. friz), 7– froze; weak forms: 4 freesed, 6 frised, 9 freezed. Pa. pple. α. 1 froren, 3–5 froren, -yn, 5–6, 9 frorn(e, 4–9 frore (4 froore, 5 froare); also 3–4 i-, yfrore. β. 4–6 frosen, -yn, 6 frose), 5–9 froze (now vulgar), (9 dial. and vulgar friz), 6– frozen; weak forms: 6 frozed, 7–8 freezed. [A Com. Teut. str. vb.: OF. fréosan = MLG. vrêsen, Du. vriezen, OHG. friosan (MHG. vriesen, mod.Ger. frieren), ON. friósa (Sw. frysa, Da. fryse), Goth. *friusan (inferred from frius frost):—OTeut. *freusan, f. root *freus-, fraus-, fruz-:—-pre-Teut. *preus-, prous-, prus-; cf. Lat. pruīna (:—? *prusvīna hoar-frost), Skr. prušva drop, frozen drop, hoar-frost; less obviously connected in sense are L. prūrīre to itch, prūna (:—*prusnā) live coal, Skr. pluš to burn; some scholars assume contamination with the Aryan root *qreus, qrus to freeze, whence Gr. κρύσταλλος ice.
The OTeut. conjugation was *freus-, fraus, fruzum, frozono-, which is accurately represented in the OE. fréosan, fréas, fruron, froren. The later Eng. form of the pa. pple. frosen, frozen (whence pa. t. froze) is due to the analogy of the pres.-stem; similarly ON. has frosenn (possibly the source of the Eng. form) beside the older frorenn, and Du. has pa. t. vroor, pa. pple. vrozen, as well as the correct vroos, vroren; the MHG. inf. vriesen, pa. t. vrôs, have become in mod. Ger. frieren, fror, through the analogy of the pa. pple. gefroren.]
I. intransitive uses.
1. impers. It freezes: the local temperature of the atmosphere is such that water becomes ice. † Also quasi-personal with a subject (frost, etc.).
971. Blickl. Hom., 93. Men hie maȝon ȝeseon swa sutole swa on niht ðonne hit swiðe freoseþ.
a. 1000. Gnomic Verses (Bosw.). Forst sceal freosan.
c. 1000. Ælfric, Gram., xxii. (Z.), 128. Gelat, hit fryst.
a. 1250. Owl & Night., 619.
| An his hou never ne vor-lost, | |
| Wan hit snuith, ne wan hit frost. |
a. 1310. in Wright’s, Lyric P., xxxix. 110. When the forst freseth, muche chele he byd.
1361. Langl., P. Pl., A. VIII. 115. Whon the Forst freseth foode hem [the foules] bi-houeth.
1393. Gower, Conf., III. 236.
| For if the month of juil shall frese | |
| And that december shall be hote, | |
| The yere mistorneth wel I wote. |
1481. Caxton, Reynard (Arb.), 82. He shal neuer take harm by colde thaugh he laye thre wynters longe nyghtis in the feelde, thaugh it snowed stormed or frore neuer so sore.
1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. VIII. (1809), 671. Still it frised, insomuche that the master of the Ordinaunce was compelled of necessitie to set the wheles of his ordinaunce on hardels for sinkyng.
1649. R. Hodges, Plain. Direct., 8. If it freez, put on your frees jacket.
1748. F. Smith, Voy. Disc. N.-W. Pass., I. 153. It snowed all Night, and froze very hard.
1837. W. Irving, Capt. Bonneville, III. 40. Thus forming a road in the wet snow, which, should it afterwards freeze, would be sufficiently hard to bear the horses.
2. Of a liquid, or liquid particles: To be converted into ice. Of a body of water: To become covered with ice. Occas. with complement, as to freeze hard, solid.
c. 1290. S. Eng. Leg., I. 317/607.
| Ȝif it is cold up an heiȝ, þe dropen bicometh to snowe, | |
| And þanne huy freosez adoneward are huy comen here ouȝt lowe. |
c. 1330. R. Brunne, Chron. (1810), 121. Þe snowe lay in þe feld, þe water frese biside.
c. 1400. Maundev. (1839), xi. 125. Thare ys a nother Ryvere, that upon the nygt freseth wondur faste.
c. 1532. Dewes, Introd. Fr., in Palsgr., 947. To frese, geller.
1692. Ray, Creation, II. (ed. 2), 122. The aqueous Humor of the Eye will not freeze.
1694. Acc. Sev. Late Voy., II. (1711), 222. The Dutch, who winter’d in Nova Zembla, took notice, that the salt Water freez’d, and that two inches thick in one night.
1748. F. Smith, Voy. Disc. N.-W. Pass., I. 159. Port Wine froze solid.
1816. J. Smith, The Panorama of Science and Art, II. 41. In frosty weather this guage cannot be used with common water. At that time some other liquor must be employed, which is not so subject to freeze, and, upon the whole, a saturated solution of common salt in water is the most eligible.
1878. A. H. Markham, Gt. Frozen Sea, v. 60. The cold spray flew aft into our faces where it almost froze.
b. To become hard or rigid as the result of cold; esp. of objects containing moisture.
1393. Gower, Conf., II. 22.
| Wherof art thou so sore afered, | |
| That thou thy tunge suffrest frese. |
1694. Acc. Sev. Late Voy., II. (1711), 208. Their Tackle was so frozen, and full of Isicles, that they could not handle them.
1715. Pope, Odyss., XIX. 238.
| As snows collected on the mountain freeze, | |
| When milder regions breath a vernal breeze. |
1748. F. Smith, Voy. Disc. N.-W. Pass., I. 21. Our Ropes were now froze with Ice hanging on them.
fig. 1848. C. Brontë, J. Eyre, xix. The smile on his lips froze.
3. To become fixed to (something) or together by the action of frost.
c. 1460. Towneley Myst. (Surtees), 99.
| When my shone freys to my fete | |
| It is not alle esy. |
1596. Shaks., Tam. Shr., IV. i. 7. Were not I a litle pot, and soone hot; my very lippes might freeze to my teeth.
1860. Tyndall, Glac., II. xxiv. 361. Here, two moist surfaces of ice being brought into close contact, their liquid liberty is destroyed and the surfaces freeze together.
Mod. In Canada a child’s tongue once froze to a lamp-post he was licking.
b. U.S. and Australian. To freeze (on) to: to hold on to (a person or thing); to keep tight hold of; also, to become attached to (a person), ‘take to.’ Cf. to stick to. Also, to freeze down.
1837–40. Haliburton, Clockm. (1862), 377. Do as I do, younker; this is the way, freeze down solid to it.
1861. Lowell, Biglow P., Poet. Wks. 1890, II. 234.
| Thet I friz right down where I wuz, merried the Widder Shennon, | |
| (Her thirds wuz part in cotton-land, part in the curse o’ Canaan). |
1876. Besant & Rice, Gold. Butterfly, II. vii. 117. No, sir; I am of the children of Israel; and I freeze to that.
1882. Sala, America Revisited, i. 225. Snuggling by his tattered side—‘freezing’ to him, as the Americans phrase it—was a tiny yellow boy of some eight years.
1883. P. Robinson, Saints & Sinners, 114. The better the Mormon, the harder he freezes to his religion—and part of his religion is polygamy—so important a part, indeed, that the whole future of the Saints is based upon it.
1888. Rider Haggard, Col. Quaritch, II. iii. 39. He’s a lawyer and he might not freeze on to you.
1890. Boldrewood, Colonial Reform. (1891), 189. ‘Here, Jem!’ he sang out, ‘freeze on to this brute behind while I make that three-cornered calamity come out of his earth.’
4. To be affected by, or have the sensation of, extreme cold; to feel very chill; to suffer the loss of vital heat; to die by frost. So to freeze to death.
1390. Gower, Conf., II. 38.
| In somer may he nought for hete, | |
| So wether that he frese or swete, | |
| Or be he in, or be he oute, | |
| He woll ben idel all aboute. |
1601. ? Marston, Pasquil & Kath., II. 363. Powre wine, sound musicke, let our blouds not freeze.
1613. Shaks., Hen. VIII., I. iv. 21. Nay, you must not freeze.
1681. Colvil, Whigs Supplic. (1751), 37.
| By the Seas motion he doth find, | |
| A North East passage to the Inde: | |
| Another he finds by the North-west, | |
| Where Davies freezed to his Rest. |
1698. J. Fryer, A New Account of East-India and Persia, 318. Had we not been active here in coursing Hares and Wild Goats, we might sooner have frozen than kept our Innate Heat entire; the Sun being constantly attended all the Day with blustering Weather, leaving a quiet Calm at setting.
1748. F. Smith, Voy. Disc. N.-W. Pass., I. 176. By being thus hung in the Air, the Rabbit is preserved from the Wolves, Foxes, Cats, and lesser Vermin, presently freezes to Death, and most commonly must be brought to the Fire before the Snare can be got off.
1817. Coleridge, Three Graves, 21.
| And when the Vicar joined their hands, | |
| Her limbs did creep and freeze; | |
| But when they prayed, she thought she saw | |
| Her mother on her knees. |
1820. Keats, Eve St. Agnes, ii.
| Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees: | |
| The sculptur’d dead, on each side, seem to freeze, | |
| Emprison’d in black, purgatorial rails: | |
| Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat’ries. |
b. Of inanimate things: To be extremely cold; to be utterly devoid of heat.
1613. Shaks., Hen. VIII., III. i. 4.
| Orpheus with his Lute made Trees, | |
| And the Mountaine tops that freeze, | |
| Bow themselues when he did sing. |
1700. Dryden, Palamon & Arcite, II. 540.
| Heav’n froze above, severe, the Clouds congeal, | |
| And through the Crystal Vault appear’d the standing Hail. |
1823. Lamb, Elia, Old Benchers I. T. His kitchen chimney was never suffered to freeze.
c. In non-material or fig. sense: To grow intensely cold; to lose warmth of feeling; to be chilled by fear, etc.; to shudder.
a. 1557. in Tottel’s Misc. (Arb.), 169.
| I burne and am a colde, | |
| I frise amids the fire: | |
| I see she doth withholde | |
| That is my most desire. |
1596. Shaks., Tam. Shr., II. i. 340. Tra. Gray-beard thy loue doth freeze.
1596. B. L[inche], Diella (1877), 74.
| Thou then didst burne in loue, now froz’d in hate, | |
| Yet pittie mee, sweete mercy ne’re comes late. |
1607. Dekker, Whore of Babylon, Wks. 1873, II. 265.
| Courage, to kill | |
| Ten men I should not freeze thus. |
1683. Cave, Ecclesiastici, Introd. 66. Zeal against Paganism did not freeze in the Western Parts.
1718. Pope, Iliad, XV. 756.
| Pale, trembling, tir’d, the Sailors freeze with Fears; | |
| And instant Death on ev’ry Wave appears. |
1874. Mahaffy, Soc. Life Greece, ix. 289. I used to think the Gorgons a mere invention (of the poets), but when I go to market I believe in them, for when I look upon the fishmongers, I become petrified, so that I have to speak to them with averted countenance; if I behold the tiny fish on which they put such a price I freeze with horror.
II. Transitive uses.
5. Of natural agencies: To change (a fluid) to a solid form by the action of cold; to congeal; to form ice on the surface of (a river, etc.). Also said causatively of personal agents.
1494. Fabyan, Chron. VII. 608–9. In this xiii. yere, and euyn of seyn Katheryn, began a froste that … frase ye Thamys so feruently, yt shyp nor bote myght come with vytayll to London.
1563. W. Fulke, Meteors (1640), 54. The North and Northern winds doe frieze the vapours; and so it becommeth hoare frost.
1570. Satir. Poems Reform., x. 325.
| Lyke as the froist dois freis vp all fresche watter, | |
| Thay freisit him in Stirling on this mater. |
1641. French, Distill., v. (1651), 164. Such is the coldnesse of an earthen vessell wherein is Nitre, dissolved in water, that it will being set in snow by the fire side forthwith be freezed.
1729. Savage, Wanderer, I. 57.
| Far hence lies, ever-freez’d, the Northern Main, | |
| That checks, and renders Navigation vain. |
1781. Cavallo, in Phil. Trans., LXXI. 516. I have froze a quantity of water with an equal weight of good ether.
1835. Sir J. Ross, Narr. 2nd Voy., xxxvi. 507. We froze oil of almonds in a shot-mould, at minus 40°, and fired it against a target; which it split, rebounding unbroken.
b. With adverbs. To freeze over: to cover with a coating of ice. To freeze in, up: to set fast in ice. To freeze up: to obstruct by frost.
1590. Shaks., Com. Err., V. i. 311.
| Though now this grained face of mine be hid | |
| In sap-consuming Winters drizled snow, | |
| And all the Conduits of my blood froze vp. |
1601. R. Johnson, Relations of the Most Famous Kingdoms, etc. (1603), 146. The rivers and other waters are frozen uppe a yearde or more thicke.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage (1614), 433. The Ozera or lake before the toune was frozen over Octob. 13.
1694. Acc. Sev. Late Voy., II. (1711), 28. An Anvile, Smith’s Tongs, and other Tools belonging to the Cookery, were frozen up in the Ice.
1719. De Foe, Crusoe, II. xv. The Baltic would be frozen up, and I could not get passage.
1748. F. Smith, Voy. Disc. N.-W. Pass., I. 105. Hudson, who wintered in a low Latitude in the South Part of the Bay, harboured his Ship the Beginning of November, and she was froze up the tenth. Ibid., 154. By the ninth the Creek was froze over from Side to Side, and could be walked upon.
1858. B. Taylor, North. Trav., xvi. 164. Six vessels lay frozen in, at a considerable distance from the town.
c. To congeal (the blood) as if by frost; chiefly as a hyperbolical expression for the effect of terror. Hence with personal obj., to ‘make (one’s) blood run cold,’ to horrify intensely.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., VII. lxvi. (1495), 283. The venyme of a scorpion … closyth the herte atte the last and fresyth the blood with his coldenesse.
1579. Spenser, Sheph. Cal., Jan., 26.
| Such rage as winters, reigneth in my heart, | |
| My life bloud friesing with vnkindly cold. |
1601. Shaks., Ham., I. v. 15.
| I would a tale vnfold, whose lightest word | |
| Would harrow vp thy soule, freeze thy yong blood. |
1633. Ford, Love’s Sacr. I. ii.
| Look here, | |
| My blood is not yet freez’d. |
1639. T. Brugis, trans. Camus’ Mor. Relat., 347. She had a beauty of face annexed unto such a majesty, that if the one inflamed me with love, the other freezed me with feare.
1707. Curios. in Husb. & Gard., 242. A cool and serious Air, capable of freezing his Readers.
1741. Richardson, Pamela (1824), I. 102. I should have melted her by love, instead of freezing her by fear.
1755. B. Martin, Mag. Arts & Sc., 79.
| One Moment’s Cold, like theirs, would pierce the Bone, | |
| Frieze the Heart’s Blood, and turn us all to Stone. |
d. fig. To chill, quench the warmth of (feelings, etc.); to paralyse (one’s powers, etc.).
1595. Shaks., John, III. iv. 150.
| This Act so euilly borne shall coole the hearts | |
| Of all his people, and freeze vp their zeale. |
1750. Gray, Elegy Written in a Country Church-yard, 50.
| But Knowledge to their Eyes her ample Page | |
| Rich with the Spoils of Time did ne’er unroll; | |
| Chill Penury repress’d their noble Rage, | |
| And froze the genial Current of the Soul. |
1793. E. Parsons, Woman as she should be, III. 133. This paragraph froze his senses.
1842. Lytton, Zanoni, 25. Far more thann the rest, that recent hiss, which had reached her in her concealment, all froze up her faculties and suspended her voice.
6. To affect with frost; to stiffen, harden, injure, kill, etc., by chilling; to change into or to (something) and fig. to bring into a certain state by chilling. Also, to freeze to death: rare in active. Occas. to allow to freeze.
1596. Shaks., Tam. Shr., IV. i. 40. My Master and mistris are almost frozen to death.
1634. Milton, Comus, 447.
| What was that snaky-headed Gorgon sheild | |
| That wise Minerva wore, unconquer’d Virgin, | |
| Wherwith she freez’d her foes to congeal’d stone? |
1700. Dryden, Palamon & Arcite, III. 839.
| This was his last; for Death came on amain, | |
| And exercis’d below his Iron Reign; | |
| Then upward, to the Seat of Life he goes; | |
| Sense fled before him, what he touch’d he froze. |
1704. Ded., in Clarendon’s Hist. Reb., III. 4. Severe Winters, that freez, wither, destroy, and and cut off many hopeful Plants, and Expectations of Things to come.
1748. F. Smith, Voy. Disc. N.-W. Pass., I. 163. And if close, the Snow lying there must freeze the Leg.
1855. Kingsley, Heroes, II. (1868), 23. But how am I to escape her eyes? Will she not freeze me too into stone?
1878. Mrs. Stowe, Poganuc People, xi. (ed. 3), 91. Spring was coming; the little blue herald was right, though he must have chilled his beak and frozen his toes as he sat there.
7. To freeze out: a. lit. in pa. pple. or ppl. a.: see FROZEN. b. fig. (U.S. colloq.) To exclude from business, society, etc., by chilling behavior, severe competition, etc.
1890. Daily News, 25 Jan., 2/2. Part of the campaign for ‘freezing out’ the Rosario Company.
