WRENCH
Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 10:12 am
An AWOL GWoTD:
• wrench •
Pronunciation: rench • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Verb
Meaning: Meaning: 1. To twist suddenly and forcibly, as to wrench a bolt. 2. To cause a sudden rush of anxiety or distress, as a wrenching experience. 3. To sprain or pull a muscle, as to wrench a knee or ankle.
Notes: We will all, of course, immediately think of the tool for wrenching, a wrench, which the British call a spanner. The English word can also be used to refer to the act of wrenching, as the news gave him a hard wrench. The relatives of this word are all purely English: 'wrenched' (back) and 'wrenching' (experience). Don't forget the silent W at the beginning of these words.
In Play: The basic sense of today's Good Word is to twist violently: "The tornado wrenched the old chinaberry tree in Forrest Glade's back yard out of the ground by the roots." The next meaning is a figurative extension of that basic meaning: "When Barnaby heard the voice of Celia Feight behind him, he turned his head so fast he wrenched his neck something awful." The final step in the semantic journey of today's word is its abstract psychological sense: "The most wrenching experience in Gooden Small's career was the time when Hugh Jeego threw a wrench in Gooden's chances for a promotion."
Word History: Most of the words beginning on WR come from a single source. Old English wrencan "to twist" (today's 'wrench') comes from the same source as Old English wringan "to wring". English 'writhe', 'wrestle', 'wrap', 'wreck', 'wriggle', 'wrist'-even 'wrong' go back to PROTO-INDO-EUROPEAN wer- "to turn, twist" with various suffixes and the normal changes accompanying them. They are all still connected by the sense of "to twist". This root emerged in Latin as vertere "to turn", seen in the English borrowings invert, convert, pervert. The past participle of 'vertere' is 'versus', another word English picked off. We see evidence of this PIE root in many Indo-European languages: Russian vertet' "to turn" and German werden "to become" from the sense of "turn into". (Lest we give Gianni Tamburini a wrench, we should thank him for such an interesting Good Word today.)