Waged

How to spell waged

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce waged

What does waged mean?

1. verbCarried on or conducted a war, battle, or sustained campaign.
2. adjectiveDescribing work or a person that earns a regular wage rather than going unpaid.

Waged in a sentence

• verb

  The two nations waged war along the border for a decade.

• adjective

  The survey compared waged employment with unpaid volunteering.

• verb

  The charity waged a long campaign against rising rents.

• adjective

  Many carers move between waged jobs and full-time family duties.

Where does waged come from?

Language of origin: French

This is the past tense of the verb 'wage', which entered English in the 1300s from the Anglo-Norman and Old French 'wager' or 'gager', meaning 'to pledge' or 'to put up as a stake'. That French verb traces back to a Germanic root, the same ancestor that gave us 'gage' (a pledge or security) and the related 'wed', since pledging was once central to a marriage promise. The original idea was of pledging oneself to a cause, which is why English later spoke of 'waging' a war or a campaign: you commit and stake yourself to carrying it on. The noun 'wage', meaning regular payment for work, grew from the same notion of a pledged sum owed. Because the verb ends in a soft '-ge' sound, the spelling keeps the silent 'e' visible right up to the 'd', so the form is 'waged' rather than the tempting but wrong 'wadged' or 'wagd'.

How the word is built

• wage (to pledge, then to carry on)
• -d (past tense suffix)