kest

v. (wk.)

Gaw pres. cast-, past. and pp.  kest, cast; Pe past pl. kesten, pp. kest, keste, kaste; Cl pres. 3 sg. kesteʒ, past 3 pl. kesten, pp. kest; Pat past 1 sg., past 3 pl., pp. kest; Erk infin. cast, pp. kest; WA infin. cast, kast, pres. 3 sg. castis, pres. pl. castis, kastis, pres. ptcp. kastand, past sg. kest, past pl. kest, kast, pp. kast, kest

‘to throw, sprinkle (water), put; lift; offer, make; utter; aim; ponder; speak; scatter; cast out, remove; scheme’ (Modern English cast)

Etymology

cp. OIcel kasta ‘to cast, throw’, apparently < PGmc *kas(a)tō(j)an- to the root of which also belong OIcel kǫs, kǫstr ‘heap, pile’.  There are no clear cognates in Go or WGmc, and an OE cognate would have shown palatalization. The variation between ME /a/ and /e/ (see LALME dot maps 716, 717) has been explained as a raising of /a/ > /e/ before /s/ plus consonant (Morsbach 119, Bj. 136 n.2, McLaughlin 1963: 58,  Kristensson 1967: 46–8, Laing and Lass 2006: 446) or as a present vs. past alternation, formed by analogy with ME lēsten ‘to last’ < OE lǣstan: pret. laste < OE *lǣst-te via shortening (Jordan-Crook §§29 Rem. 2, 32 Rem. 3, following  Luick §§384 Anm. 2, 352 Anm. 3). 

PGmc Ancestor

*kas(a)tō(j)an- 

Proposed ON Etymon (OIcel representative)

kasta ‘to cast, throw’
(ONP kasta (vb.))

Other Scandinavian Reflexes

Far kasta, Icel kasta, Norw kasta, Dan kaste, Sw kasta

OE Cognate

Phonological and morphological markers

absence of palatalization of */k/

Summary category

A1

Attestation

Widespread from early ME. 

Occurrences in the Gersum Corpus

Gaw 64, 228, 249 etc.; Pe 66, 861, 1122 etc.; Cl 234, 414, 460 etc.; Pat 153, 154, 157, etc.; Erk 83, 317; WA 138, 163, 184 etc. 

Gaw 1696 costez is emended in some editions (including M(G), GDS, CA, W, AW) to *c[a]stez, but the MS reading is defended by Knott 1915: 106, Onions 1923: 285-6, TGD and Vant (though their interpretations of the word vary: see costez). On the sense 'speak', see PS n249. On the sense 'sprinkle, cast (water)' in Erk, see Peterson 317n. The D MS of WA reads <lost hase> for kest away at 2051.

Bibliography

MED casten (v.) , OED cast (v.) , HTOED , HTOED , HTOED , HTOED , EDD cast (v.), Dance kest (a)(v.), Bj. 142, 215, de Vries kasta, Mag. kasta (1), Bj-L. kaste