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''yearn'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260331180822-00-⌔
yearn - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Verb

yearn (third-person singular simple present yearns, present participle yearning, simple past and past participleyearned or (rare) yearnt)

(intransitive, also figuratively) To have a strong desire for something or to do something; to long for or to do something.

✤ Synonyms: pant, salivate

✤ All I yearn for is a simple life.

✤ I muſt do that my heart-ſtrings yern to do: but my word’s paſt.¹

✤ You are now before my eyes, my eyes that are ready to flow with tenderness, but cannot give relief to my gushing heart, that dictates what I am now saying, and yearns to tell you all its achings.²

✤ By morning’s cheerful glow, but oftener still by evening’s gentle light, the child, with a respect for the short and happy intercourse of these two sisters which forbade her to approach and say a thankful word, although she yearned to do so, followed them at a distance in their walks and rambles, […]³

✤ What his soul yearned after was control of his father’s newly purchased sailing-ship.⁴

✤ And Jim supported his twitching body by holding on to the sink, the while he yearned toward the yellowish concoction that stood for life.⁵

✤ But all that night his body yearned for Alec’s, despite him. He called it lustful, a word easily uttered, and opposed it to his work, his family, his friends, his position in society. […] But his body would not be convinced.⁶

✤ Anne, please tell me over again that you like me a little bit. I yearn to hear it.⁷

(specifically) To long for something in the past with melancholy or nostalgia.

✤ If I don’t go now, thought Charlotte, I shall have lost a chance which I shall eternally regret and yearn after.⁸

✤ Having shaken the dust of the ugly new South Africa from his feet, is he yearning for the South Africa of the old days, when Eden was still possible?⁹

(intransitive) Of music, words, etc.: to express strong desire or longing.

✤ The music, yearning like a God in pain,/She scarcely heard: […]¹⁰

(intransitive, dated) To have strong feelings of affection, love, sympathy, etc., toward someone.

✤ And Joſeph made haſte: for his bowels did yerne upon his brother: and he ſought where to weepe, and hee entred into his chamber, & wept there.¹¹

✤ I have left your mother in the next room. Her heart yearns towards you.¹²

✤ Oh, it was a pretty sight to see this modest young creature, little more than a child herself, anticipating maternity, but blushing every now and then, and looking askant at her lord and master. How his very bowels yearned over her!¹³

✤ […] Mr. Ratcliffe’s heart yearned toward the charming girl quite with the sensations of a father, or even of an elder brother.¹⁴

✤ But supper had cheered Tant’ Sannie, who found it impossible longer to maintain that decorous silence, and whose heart yearned over the youth.¹⁵

(intransitive, obsolete) To be distressed or pained; to grieve; to mourn.

✤ My father’s and my uncle Toby ’s hearts yearn’d with ſympathy for the poor fellow’s diſtreſs,— […]¹⁶

(transitive) Often followed by out: to perform (music) which conveys or say (words) which express strong desire or longing.

(transitive, archaic or poetic) To have a strong desire or longing (for something or to do something).

✤ Synonym: (obsolete) earn

(transitive, obsolete) To cause (someone) to have strong feelings of affection, love, sympathy, etc.; also, to grieve or pain (someone).

✤ Synonym: (obsolete) earn

✤ Well, ſhe laments Sir for it, that it would yern your heart to see it: […]¹⁷

✤ It yernes me not, if men my Garments weare;/Nor care I who doth feed vpon my coſt:/Such outward things dwell not in my deſires./But if it be a ſinne to couet Honor,/I am the moſt offending Soule aliue.¹⁸

✤ When the badger finds that the terriers yearn him in his burrow, he will stop the hole between him and the terriers; […]¹⁹

✤ Wants to sneeze and cannot do it!/Now it yearns me, thrills me, stings me,/Now with rapturous torment wrings me,/Now says “Sneeze, you fool; get through it.”²⁰

Noun

yearn (plural yearns)

A strong desire or longing; a yearning, a yen.

✤ Synonyms: lust, urge; see also Thesaurus: craving

1917 August 12, “A YEARN FOR PEACE; Pan-Germanism Denounced”, in Sunday Times, Perth, WA, page 1:

✤ Gibbs now said he wasn’t going to pull any punches with Gary when he knew how jealous a man could get, so he also wanted to tell him that Phil Hansen was reputed to have a yearn for attractive ladies.²¹

✤ “After he had made a record date with us in 1935, I always had a yearn for Ben,” he said years later.²²

✤ “My guess, however, is that it has because there are many people who have a yearn for sex outside their relationship but wouldn’t have the slightest idea about how to do it or do it safely,” Prof Schwartz added.²³

Verb

yearn (third-person singular simple present yearns, present participle yearning, simple past and past participle yearned)

(Northern England, Scotland, intransitive)

Of milk: to curdle, especially in the cheesemaking process.

✤ Synonyms: (obsolete or regional) earn, run

Of cheese: to be made from curdled milk.

(Northern England, Scotland, transitive)

To curdle (milk), especially in the cheesemaking process.

To make (cheese) from curdled milk.

✤ Also his Honour the Duke will accept ane of our Dunlop cheeses, and it sall be my faut if a better was ever yearned in Lowden.²⁴

Pronunciation

(Received Pronunciation) IPA: /jɜːn/

(General American) enPR: yûrn, IPA: /jɝn/

Audio (General American): 🔊

Homophone: yern

Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)n

Etymology 1

The verb is derived from Middle English yernen, yern (“to express or feel desire; to desire, long or wish for; to lust after; to ask or demand for”) [and other forms],²⁵ from Old English ġeornan (“to desire, yearn; to beg”) [and other forms], from Proto-West Germanic ﹡girnijan (“to be eager for, desire”), from Proto-Germanic ﹡girnijaną (“to desire, want”), from ﹡gernaz (“eager, willing”) (from Proto-Indo-European ﹡gʰer- (“to yearn for”)) + ﹡-janą (suffix forming factitive verbs from adjectives).²⁶

The noun is derived from the verb.²⁷

Etymology 2

Probably either:²⁸

a variant of earn (“to curdle, as milk”) (though this word is attested later), from Middle English erne, ernen (“to coagulate, congeal”) (chiefly South Midlands) [and other forms], a metathetic variant of rennen (“to run; to coagulate, congeal”), from Old English rinnan (“to run”) (with the variants iernan, irnan) and Old Norse rinna (“to move quickly, run; of liquid: to flow, run; to melt”),²⁹ both ultimately from Proto-Indo-European ﹡h₃er- (“to move, stir; to rise, spring”); or

a back-formation from yearning (“(Scotland, archaic) rennet; calf (or other animal’s) stomach used to make rennet”).

Printed 2026-06-28.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

c. 1613 (first performance), John Fletcher, “The Tragedie of Bonduca”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, Act II, scene iv, page 56, column 2: ↩

1711 August 24 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “MONDAY, August 13, 1711”, in The Spectator, number 142; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume II, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 243: ↩

1840 April – 1841 November, Charles Dickens, “Chapter the Thirty-second”, in The Old Curiosity Shop. A Tale. […], volume I, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1841, →OCLC, page 274: ↩

1896 November – 1897 May, Rudyard Kipling, chapter X, in “Captains Courageous”, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, published 1897, →OCLC, page 298: ↩

1911 January, Jack London, “Just Meat”, in When God Laughs and Other Stories, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, →OCLC, page 125: ↩

1913–1960 (writing and revisions), E[dward] M[organ] Forster, chapter 40, in Maurice, London: Penguin Books, published 1971 (1987 printing), →ISBN, page 181: ↩

1915, L[ucy] M[aud] Montgomery, “Letters from Home”, in Anne of the Island, New York, N.Y.: A[lbert] L[evi] Burt Company, →OCLC, page 50: ↩

1971, Iris Murdoch, An Accidental Man, New York, N.Y.: Viking Press, published February 1972, →ISBN, page 420: ↩

2002, J[ohn] M[axwell] Coetzee, chapter 17, in Youth: Scenes from Provincial Life II, 1st American edition, London: Vintage Books, →ISBN, page 137: ↩

1819, John Keats, “The Eve of St. Agnes”, in Lamia, Isabella, the Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems, London: […] [Thomas Davison] for Taylor and Hessey, […], published 1820, →OCLC, stanza VII, page 86: ↩

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Genesis 43:30, column 1: ↩

1711 August 1 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “SATURDAY, July 21, 1711”, in The Spectator, number 123; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume II, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 158: ↩

1873, Charles Reade, chapter XII, in A Simpleton: A Story of the Day […], volume II, London: Chapman and Hall, […], →OCLC, pages 99–100: ↩

1880, [Henry Brooks Adams], chapter III, in Democracy: An American Novel (Leisure-hour Series; no. 112), New York, N.Y.: Henry Holt and Company, →OCLC, page 52: ↩

1883 June, Ralph Iron [pseudonym; Olive Schreiner], “Tant’ Sannie Holds an Upsitting, and Gregory Writes a Letter”, in The Story of an African Farm, 2nd edition, New York, N.Y.: H. M. Caldwell Company, →OCLC, part II, page 248: ↩

1759, [Laurence Sterne], chapter XVII, in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, 2nd (1st London) edition, volume II, London: […] R[obert] and J[ames] Dodsley […], published 1760, →OCLC, page 144: ↩

c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene v], page 52, column 2: ↩

1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii], page 86, column 2: ↩

1833, [William Hamilton Maxwell], “Badger-hunting”, in The Field Book: Or, Sports and Pastimes of the United Kingdom; […], London: Effingham Wilson, →OCLC, page 31, column 2: ↩

1834 June 25, Leigh Hunt, “A Pinch of Snuff (Concluded.)”, in Leigh Hunt’s London Journal, volume I, number 13, London: Charles Knight, […]; and Henry Hooper, […], →OCLC, page 98, column 1: ↩

1979, Norman Mailer, The Executioner’s Song ‎ $^{[1]}$ : ↩

2010, Frank Buchmann-Moller, Someone to Watch Over Me: The Life and Music of Ben Webster, University of Michigan Press, →ISBN, page 57: ↩

2014 February 13, AFP, “Why internet adultery numbers are soaring”, in New Zealand Herald: ↩

1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter II, in Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume IV, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC, page 24: ↩

“yernen, v.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007. ↩

Compare “yearn, v. $^{1}$ ”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, March 2021; “yearn, v.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022. ↩

“yearn, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, March 2018. ↩

“yearn, v. $^{2}$ ”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2020. ↩

“rennen, v. (1)”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007. ↩

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''yearn'' ▫ᴱᴺ

Entries

''yearn'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260331180822-00-⌔

English

Verb

Noun

Verb

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

Etymology 2

Footnotes

Fields