bide

verb

bode ˈbōd How to pronounce bide (audio) or bided; bided; biding

transitive verb

1
past tense usually bided : to wait for
used chiefly in the phrase bide one's time
is biding his time before asking for a raise
2
archaic : withstand
two men … might bide the winter stormW. C. Bryant
3
chiefly dialectal : to put up with : tolerate
… couldn't bide children on his place …J. W. Riley

intransitive verb

1
: to continue in a state or condition
bide still a moment
2
: to wait awhile : tarry
3
: to continue in a place : sojourn
bide in a cabin
bider noun

Examples of bide in a Sentence

how long are you going to bide in this unhappy marriage? at my advanced age I simply cannot bide young children
Recent Examples on the Web Back in 2020, while some folks were learning to speak another language or taking up a new hobby to bide their time during the pandemic, Tess Sanchez went a completely different route. Wendy Bowman, Robb Report, 8 Mar. 2024 By focusing so much energy on eliminating some players, the show seemed to be biding time with the all-important Lannister–Targaryen–Stark trio. Darren Franich, EW.com, 29 Feb. 2024 Russia appears content to suffer casualties, biding its time until Ukraine exhausts the means to defend itself. TIME, 13 Feb. 2024 Everybody loves a good indie-rock origin story — like Paul Westerberg holding it down as a janitor in the office of a Minnesota senator before joining the Replacements, or Dayton, Ohio’s Robert Pollard teaching grade school while biding his time before Guided By Voices became a thing. Jon Dolan, Rolling Stone, 7 Feb. 2024 Libertyville’s Rachel Rule was just biding her time. Bobby Narang, Chicago Tribune, 26 Jan. 2024 Underneath it all, the mimetic mechanism is whirring, biding its time between crises. Michelle Orange, Harper's Magazine, 3 Nov. 2023 For two years, Moss had been relegated to the role of Williams’ understudy, biding his time as a backup until his chance would finally arrive. Ryan Kartje, Los Angeles Times, 28 Dec. 2023 Keeping track of time, for instance, is a function that’s essential to all living things, from microorganisms biding their time till the next cell division to embryos growing limbs and organs, to more complex critters tracking the passage of day and night. Quanta Magazine, 19 Dec. 2023

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'bide.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

Middle English biden "to stay, linger, wait expectantly, hope for, undergo," going back to Old English bīdan, past bād, bidon, past participle biden, going back to Germanic *bīðan- (whence also Old Saxon bīdan "to wait, stand ready, hold out," Old High German bītan "to wait, expect," Old Norse bíða "to wait for, suffer, undergo," Gothic beidan "to wait for, endure"), perhaps going back to Indo-European *bhei̯d- "entrust, trust" — more at faith entry 1

Note: The argument has been made, most notably by Émile Benveniste (Le vocabulaire des institutions indo-européennes, Paris, 1969, tome 1, pp. 119-20), that in Germanic an older sense "place one's trust in something" developed into "expect with confidence, wait for" and then "undergo, endure"—though this hypothesis has not been universally accepted.

First Known Use

before the 12th century, in the meaning defined at transitive sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of bide was before the 12th century

Dictionary Entries Near bide

Cite this Entry

“Bide.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bide. Accessed 19 Mar. 2024.

Kids Definition

bide

verb
bode ˈbōd How to pronounce bide (audio) or bided; bided; biding
: to wait or wait for
bided his time before acting

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