wake

present singular third person wakes · participle present waking · past woke · past waked · participle past woken · participle past waked · colloquial participle past woke · first person past singular woke · first person past singular waked · archaic present second person singular wakest · past second person singular woke · past second person singular waked · archaic past second person singular wokest · present singular third person wakes · archaic present singular third person waketh · past singular third person woke

1. intransitive(often followed by up) To stop sleeping.

   I woke up at four o'clock this morning.

   1 more example

   How long I slept I cannot tell, for I had nothing to guide me to the time, but woke at length, and found myself still in darkness.

   [1898], J[ohn] Meade Falkner, Moonfleet, London; Toronto, Ont.: Jonathan Cape, published 1934, →OCLC

   Synonyms: get up, stir

2. transitive(often followed by up) To make somebody stop sleeping; to rouse from sleep.

   The neighbour's car alarm woke me from a strange dream.

   1 more example

   And the Angell that talked with me, came againe and waked me, […]

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Zechariah 4:1

   Synonyms: awaken, rouse, arouse, awake, awaken, bring round, cry, knock up

3. figurativelytransitiveTo put in motion or action; to arouse; to excite.

   Even Richard's crusade woke little interest in his island realm.

   1880, John Richard Green, History of the English People

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   Not for my life, leſt fierce remembrance wake My ſudden rage to tear thee joint by joint.

   1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes, […].”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 59

   Synonyms: awaken, rouse, abet, actuate, goose, fuel, light a fire under, send

4. figurativelyintransitiveTo be excited or roused up; to be stirred up from a dormant, torpid, or inactive state; to be active.

   and gentle Aires due at thir hour To fan the Earth now wak'd,

   1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 93–94

   1 more example

   Then wake, my soul, to high desires, And earlier light thine altar fires: […]

   1827, [John Keble], “Easter Day”, in The Christian Year: Thoughts in Verse for the Sundays and Holydays throughout the Year, volume I, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] [B]y W. Baxter, for J. Parker; and C[harles] and J[ohn] Rivington, […], →OCLC, page 146

   Synonyms: quicken, start, startle

5. To watch, or sit up with, at night, as a dead body.

   Dougal said that being alone with the dead on that floor of the tower (for naebody cared to wake Sir Robert Redgauntlet like another corpse) he had never daured^([sic]) to answer the call, but that now his conscience checked him for neglecting his duty; […]

   1824, Sir Walter Scott, Redgauntlet

   Synonyms: bewake, watch

6. To be or remain awake; not to sleep.

   , Book II, Chapter I I cannot think any time, waking or sleeping, without being sensible of it.

   2 more examples

   The father waketh for the daughter when no man knoweth, and the care for her taketh away sleepe;

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Ecclesiasticus 42:9

   And oft though wiſdom wake, ſuspicion ſleeps At wiſdoms Gate,

   1667, John Milton, “Book III”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 696–697

   Synonyms: stay up, watch

7. obsoleteTo be alert; to keep watch

   Command unto the guards that they diligently wake.

   Synonyms: bewake, invigilate, keep watch, watch

8. obsoleteTo sit up late for festive purposes; to hold a night revel.

   The king doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse, Keeps wassail, and the swaggering upspring reels.

   c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene iv]

plural wakes

1. A period after a person's death before or after the body is buried, cremated, etc.; in some cultures accompanied by a party or collectively sorting through the deceased's personal effects.

   Where any person has died whilst being, or suspected of being, a case or carrier or contact of an infectious disease, the Director may by order prohibit the conduct of a wake over the body of that person or impose such conditions as he thinks fit on the conduct of such wake […]

   2003, Section 14(1)(a), Infectious Diseases Act (Cap. 137, R. Ed. 2003)

2. The state of forbearing sleep, especially for solemn or festive purposes; a vigil.

   The wood nymphs, deckt with daises trim, Their merry wakes and pastimes keep.

   Comus

   1634 October 9 (first performance; Gregorian calendar), [John Milton], edited by H[enry] Lawes, A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634: […] [Comus], London: […] [Augustine Matthews] for Hvmphrey Robinson, […], published 1637, →OCLC; reprinted as Comus: […] (Dodd, Mead & Company’s Facsimile Reprints of Rare Books; Literature Series; no. I), New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1903, →OCLC

   1 more example

   The warlike wakes continued all the night, And funeral games played at new returning light.

   1697, Virgil, “Palamon and Arcite”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC

3. Church of EnglandhistoricalA yearly parish festival formerly held in commemoration of the dedication of a church. Originally, prayers were said on the evening preceding, and hymns were sung during the night, in the church; subsequently, these vigils were discontinued, and the day itself, often with succeeding days, was occupied in rural pastimes and exercises, attended by eating and drinking.

   1523–1525, Jean Froissart, John Bourchier, 2nd Baron Berners (translator), Froissart's Chronicles Great solemnities were made in all churches, and great fairs and wakes throughout all England.

   1 more example

   And every village smokes at wakes with lusty cheer.

   1612, Michael Drayton, “(please specify the chapter)”, in [John Selden], editor, Poly-Olbion. Or A Chorographicall Description of Tracts, Riuers, Mountaines, Forests, and Other Parts of this Renowned Isle of Great Britaine, […], London: […] [Humphrey Lownes] for M[athew] Lownes; I[ohn] Browne; I[ohn] Helme; I[ohn] Busbie, →OCLC

4. obsoleteoftenpoeticThe act of waking, or state of being awake.

   Singing her flatteries to my morning wake.

   1677 (first performance), John Dryden, All for Love: Or, The World Well Lost. A Tragedy, […], [London]: […] Tho[mas] Newcomb, for Henry Herringman, […], published 1678, →OCLC, (please specify the page number)

   2 more examples

   Making such difference 'twixt wake and sleep.

   c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i]

   After a few weeks of age, longer periods of sleep and wake are seen […]

   2013, William H. Moorcroft, Understanding Sleep and Dreaming, page 27

5. collectiveA group of vultures or buzzards.

   New at the Houston Zoo: A scary, misunderstood wake of vultures

   2021 July 7, Jay R. Jordan, “New at the Houston Zoo: A scary, misunderstood wake of vultures”, in Chron.com, archived from the original on 26 Jul 2026

   2 more examples

   Growing up out in the country past University Lake, we’d frequently see a wake of vultures along the side of the road, in a pasture and sometimes even in the woods, quietly picking away at something.

   2025 September 1, Margot Lester, “Why Vultures Deserve a Better Reputation”, in Chapelboro.com, archived from the original on 26 Jul 2026

   Ricky Lanusse (23 July 2024), “How The Collapse of India’s Vultures Led to Half a Million Human Deaths”, in Medium.com, archived from the original on 26 Jul 2026: “A wake of vultures — possibly a mix of Himalayan Griffons and Indian Vultures — feed on a buffalo in Panna Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh.”

plural wakes

1. nauticalThe path left behind a ship on the surface of the water.
2. The disturbance which follows an object, person or animal moving through water.
3. aeronauticsThe turbulent air left behind a flying aircraft.
4. figurativelyThe area behind a moving person or object.

   The player left the rest of the field trailing in her wake.

   4 more examples

   This effect followed immediately in the wake of his earliest exertions.

   1826, Thomas De Quincey, “Lessing”, in Blackwood's Magazine

   Several humbler persons […] formed quite a procession in the dusty wake of his chariot wheels.

   1857–1859, W[illiam] M[akepeace] Thackeray, The Virginians. A Tale of the Last Century, volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1858–1859, →OCLC

   It was all of a piece. If you believed in capitalism, you had to attack science, because science had revealed the hazards that capitalism had brought in its wake.

   2010, Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway, chapter 5, in Merchants of Doubt

   Alex Song launched a long ball forward from the back and the winger took it down nicely on his chest. He cut across the penalty area from the right and after one of the three defenders in his wake failed to make a meaningful clearance, the Oxlade-Chamberlain was able to dispatch a low left-footed finish into the far corner.

   2011 September 28, Tom Rostance, “Arsenal 2 - 1 Olympiakos”, in BBC Sport

5. natural sciencesThe perturbation behind a body moving through a fluid.

1. A surname.

   The testator, in this cause, devised and bequeathed an equal fifth part of his real estate, and of his residuary personal estate, to the plaintiff Mrs. Wake, the wife of the plaintiff Mr. Wake[…]

   1838, The Law Journal Reports, volume 7, page 93

2. abbreviationellipsisEllipsis of Wake County.

   3 more examples

   Mr. Boylan was public-spirited and progressive. He first saw the possibilities, and set the example of raising great quantities of cotton on the uplands of Wake.[...]Governor Swain says of him that he was dignified and grave, and it also is sure that he must have been charitable, for he is responsible for the building of the first county poor-house in Wake.

   1922, Hope Summerell Chamberlain, “Giants of Those Days”, in History of Wake County North Carolina, With Sketches of those who have Most Influenced its Development, Raleigh: Edwards & Broughton Printing Company, →OCLC, pages 144–145

   Trade with the Indians. — There is every likelihood that the brisk trade that flourished between the settlers on the coast and the Indians in the interior, both before and after the Tuscarora War, included trade in and through the woods of Wake. Although the “Trading Path to the Indians” described by William Byrd in 1728 when surveying the Virginia-Carolina dividing line passed to the north and west of Wake, there was trading through Wake’s forests. The celebrated “Green’s Path” from eastern Virginia toward the southward lay along portions of the present boundary line between Wake and Johnston counties; and the “Pee Dee Trail” traversed southern Wake County on its east-west route between Johnston and Chatham counties.

   1983, Elizabeth Reid Murray, “The Beginnings of Wake County's History”, in Wake, Capital Country of North Carolina, volume I, Raleigh: Captial County Publishing Company, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 12

   At the other end of the spectrum, Guilford County consistently displayed school- and classroom-level segregation indexes well above the state average. In a district where approximately half of all students were nonwhite, the average white student at all grade levels sat in a classroom where fewer than a third of the pupils were nonwhite. In other words, the typical white student in Guilford attended classes with nearly the same racial composition as the typical white student in Wake despite the fact that the overall percentage of nonwhite students in Guilford was 13 points higher.

   2005, Charles T. Clotfelter, Helen F. Ladd, Jacob L. Vigdor, “Classroom-Level Segregation and Resegregation in North Carolina”, in School Resegregation: Must the South Turn Back?, University of North Carolina Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 78

3. abbreviationellipsisEllipsis of Wake Island.

   This is my first time to be back on Wake in sixty-one years.

   2003, Jack R. Skaggs, Wake Island : the Alamo of the Pacific, History Channel, →OCLC

   2 more examples

   This rendezvous at Wake took place on December 7, and for the next several days on board the Helena we were busy.

   1963, Dwight Eisenhower, “A Changed World, Formation of a Cabinet, a Mission to Korea”, in Mandate for Change 1953-1956, Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 96

   It takes only a brief glimpse at a 1941 map of the Pacific to see why Wake Island was considered to be of such strategic value to the United States and why it was such an early target in Japan's program of conquest. As the war planners on both sides saw the situation in the late 1930s, possession of Wake was vital to the defense of their territory.

   1978, Duane Schultz, “"To Deny Wake to the Enemy"”, in Wake Island: The Heroic, Gallant Fight, New York: St. Martin's Press, →OCLC, page 13