Blow

How to spell blow

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce blow

What does blow mean?

1. verbTo send out a current of air, or to be moved by such a current.
2. nounA forceful stroke or impact, or a sudden setback.

Blow in a sentence

• verb

  A cold wind began to blow across the open field.

• noun

  The boxer landed a heavy blow to his opponent's ribs.

• verb

  She leaned forward to blow out the candles on the cake.

• noun

  Losing the contract was a serious blow to the small firm.

Where does blow come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word descends from the Old English verb blawan, meaning 'to blow' or 'to breathe', a thoroughly native Germanic word with relatives across the family, including the German blahen 'to swell or puff up'. Those forms all trace back to a Proto-Indo-European root meaning 'to swell, blow, or inflate', which is why blowing air and something being blown up or puffed out feel so closely related. The noun sense meaning 'a hard hit' has a separate but parallel Germanic background and was already established in English by the 1400s, possibly reinforced by related verbs of striking. The spelling keeps the old -ow ending shared with grow, snow, and know, where the 'ow' sounds like a long o rather than the 'ow' in cow, which is the small reading trap. Because it is such an ancient everyday word, its form has stayed remarkably stable for over a thousand years.

How the word is built

• blow (from Old English blawan: to blow, breathe); a single root word with no prefix or suffix