Eager

How to spell eager

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce eager

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does eager mean?

1. adjectiveStrongly wanting to do or have something; full of keen interest or impatient enthusiasm.

Eager in a sentence

• The new recruits were eager to prove themselves on their first day.

• Investors are eager for any sign that interest rates will fall.

Where does eager come from?

Language of origin: French

Eager travelled into English from the Old French word aigre, which meant 'sharp', 'sour', or 'biting', the same word that survives in the culinary term vinaigre, literally 'sour wine', the ancestor of our vinegar. Behind the French lay the Latin acer, meaning 'sharp', 'keen', or 'pungent', a root that also gives us acrid, acid, and acute. When the word reached Middle English in the 1200s it kept that edge of sharpness, so to be eager once meant to be fierce, severe, or even bitter to the taste. Over time the sense softened from a sharp edge on a blade or a flavour to a sharp keenness of feeling, giving us the modern meaning of being intensely keen or impatient to do something. The spelling kept the -ea- and the soft -ger from its French phase, which is why it looks nothing like its hard-c Latin cousins.

How the word is built

• eager (from Old French aigre 'sharp, keen'; ultimately Latin acer 'sharp')