Frozen

How to spell frozen

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce frozen

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does frozen mean?

1. adjectiveTurned hard and solid by extreme cold, or kept at a temperature below freezing.
2. adjectiveHeld still or prevented from changing, as with funds, prices, or movement.

Frozen in a sentence

• The frozen peas went straight from the freezer into the pan.

• Staff pay has been frozen for the third year running.

• The path was dangerous because the puddles had frozen overnight.

• Her bank account was frozen during the fraud investigation.

Where does frozen come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Frozen is the past participle of the verb freeze, which descends from the Old English frēosan, meaning 'to turn to ice' or 'to be very cold'. That verb traces back to a Germanic root shared with Dutch vriezen and German frieren, and ultimately to an ancient root meaning 'to be cold' that also gave Latin its word for frost. The strong-verb pattern of Old English produced forms like 'freeze, froze, frozen', the same vowel-shifting family as 'choose, chose, chosen', and that old -en participle ending is why the word closes with -en rather than -ed. Over the centuries the literal sense of ice extended into figurative uses, so wages, bank accounts, and even people can now be described as frozen when they are held still. The single z, surrounded by a soft 'oh' vowel, is the only mild trap, since the sound could tempt a writer toward a double letter.

How the word is built

• froze (past tense of freeze, from Old English frēosan: to freeze)
• -en (past participle suffix)