dwine

present singular third person dwines · participle present dwining · participle past dwined · past dwined

1. archaic outside Scotland and dialectsTo wither, decline, pine away.

   Without visible mark or sign she was elf-shot; and the proof of this appeared from her going off her milk, dwining away, and dying before her calves could be counted on the hooves of one foot.

   1897 August 5, The Morning Bulletin, Rockhampton, Qld, page 4, column 5

1. countableno pluralrareuncountableDecline, wane.

   They stopped only when they came to the first deep pools gleaming with oily reflections in the dwine of the daylight.

   2009, Sheri S. Tepper, Grass, page 327

   1 more example

   Old Mrs. Jennery, of Springholm, never had a daughter of her own, neither had her son, the father of the twin lads whom he left to his mother's care when he died of the dwine, as the country-folk called it.

   1896, The Sunday at Home, volume 43, page 750

   Synonyms: dwindling, dwining