v. (wk.)
Gaw past waret
‘to deal, deliver; spend, employ’
(Modern English ware)Most authorities derive ME ware from the ON v. represented by OIcel verja, whose meanings ‘to invest money, lay out; exert oneself’ accord more closely with the ME word than those of its OE cognate (thus OED, MED, GDS, McGee 355). OE verbs of the form warian are widely attested in a very broad range of senses, as I. ‘to be wary, beware; guard, protect, defend; warn; hold, possess, attend; inhabit’ and II. ‘to make a treaty (with)’ (CH). The etymology of the first group of senses is relatively clear: cp. OFris waria, OS, OHG warōn ‘protect’, OIcel vara ‘to warn’, all probably formed on the PGmc fem. noun *warō(n), which is in turn connected to the adj. *wara- (OE wær ‘wary, aware of, ready’ etc.). Advocates for native derivation of the ME v. point to the second sense of OE warian (TGD and (partly) MED), but this presents difficulties; it is conceivably a development of the main v. warian (perhaps via a meaning like ‘to protect (reciprocally)’ > ‘to make a secure arrangement, make a deal’?), or a secondary formation on OE waru ‘ware, article of merchandise’ (i.e. ‘to make a deal (about merchandise)’ > ‘to make a deal (generally)’). A native sense development from the OE v. in its first, or indeed second, sense, thus remains a possibility.
PGmc Ancestor
*warō(n)
Proposed ON Etymon (OIcel representative)
verja ‘to invest money, lay out; exert oneself’
(ONP verja (5) (vb.))
Other Scandinavian Reflexes
Far verja, Icel verja, Norw verja, Dan værge, OSw värja, Sw värja
OE Cognate
warian I. ‘to be wary, beware; guard, protect, defend; warn; hold, possess, attend; inhabit’ and II. ‘to make a treaty (with)’
Phonological and morphological markers
Summary category
CC3c
In most senses cited in MED, the word seems mainly to have been N and E (though there are exceptions, e.g. a1450 LDirige(1) (Dgb 102), put in Wor. by LALME LP 7770) and is attested only from the later 14c. MED’s sense (d) ‘to possess or enjoy (goods, property)’ (etc.) is found earlier, and without evident dial bias. MnE Sc. and N/EM dial usage is cited by EDD and OED.
Occurrences in the Gersum Corpus
Gaw 402, 1235, 2344