tread
English
Alternative forms
Pronunciation
Etymology 1
From Middle EnglishCategory:English terms inherited from Middle English#TREADCategory:English terms derived from Middle English#TREAD treden, from Old EnglishCategory:English terms inherited from Old English#TREADCategory:English terms derived from Old English#TREAD tredan, from Proto-West GermanicCategory:English terms inherited from Proto-West Germanic#TREADCategory:English terms derived from Proto-West Germanic#TREAD *tredan, from Proto-GermanicCategory:English terms inherited from Proto-Germanic#TREADCategory:English terms derived from Proto-Germanic#TREAD *trudaną.
Verb
tread (third-person singular simple present treads, present participle treading, simple past trod or tread or treaded, past participle trodden or trod or tread or treaded)Category:English lemmas#TREADCategory:English verbs#TREADCategory:English entries with incorrect language header#TREADCategory:Pages with entries#TREADCategory:Pages with 1 entry#TREAD
- (intransitiveCategory:English intransitive verbs#TREAD) To step or walk (on or across something); to trample.
- He trod back and forth wearily.Category:English terms with usage examples#TREAD
- Don't tread on the lawn.Category:English terms with usage examples#TREAD
- 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Joshua 14:9:
- And Moses sware on that day, saying, Surely the land whereon thy feet haue troden, shall be thine inheritance, and thy childrens for euer, because thou hast wholly followed the Lord my God.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- 1711, Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism, part III:
- Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost:
- yee that walk The Earth, and stately tread, or lowly creepCategory:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- (transitiveCategory:English transitive verbs#TREAD) To step or walk upon.
- Actors tread the boards.Category:English terms with usage examples#TREAD
- (figuratively, with certain adverbs of manner) To proceed, to behave (in a certain manner).
- to tread lightly, to tread gentlyCategory:English terms with usage examples#TREAD
- to tread carefully, to tread cautiously, to tread warilyCategory:English terms with usage examples#TREAD
- To beat or press with the feet.
- to tread a path; to tread land when too light; a well-trodden pathCategory:English terms with usage examples#TREAD
- To work a lever, treadle, etc., with the foot or the feet.
- 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 251:
- Round about them was a circle of girls and wives of the neighbouring tenants; "they trod the spinning-wheels with diligent feet, or were using the scraping carding-combs," as an author has it.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- To go through or accomplish by walking, dancing, etc.
- 1616–1619 (first performance), John Fletcher, Philip Massinger, Nathan Field, “The Knight of Malta”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, Act V, scene ii:
- I am resolved to forsake Malta, tread a pilgrimage to fair Jerusalem.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
- They have measured many a mile, / To tread a measure with you on this grass.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- To crush under the foot; to trample in contempt or hatred; to subdue; to repress.
- Synonym: step on
- 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 44:5:
- Through thee will we push down our enemies: through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- (intransitiveCategory:English intransitive verbs#TREAD) To copulate; said of (especially male) birds.
- c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
- When Turtles tread, and Rookes and Dawes,Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
And Maidens bleach their summer smockes:
- (transitiveCategory:English transitive verbs#TREAD, of a male bird) To copulate with (a hen).
- 1923, D. H. Lawrence, Fantasia of the Unconscious:
- But if a child sees a cockerel tread a hen, or two dogs coupling, well and good. It should see these things.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- 1927, Havelock Ellis, Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6):
- This bird used to try to tread her fellow-hens.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- (transitiveCategory:English transitive verbs#TREAD) To crush grapes with one's feet to make wine
Usage notes
- Treaded is not commonly used in the UK and is less common in the US as well. It is apparently used more often in tread water.
- Tread is sometimes used as a past and past participle, especially in the US.
Derived terms
- as ever trod shoe-leather
- betread
- don't tread on me
- downtrodden
- fools rush in where angels fear to tread
- have the black ox tread on one's foot
- retread (etymology 2)
- tread a measure
- tread carefully
- tread down
- tread in someone's (foot)steps
- treadle
- tread-lightly
- tread lightly
- tread on eggshells
- tread on someone's corns/toes
- tread on, uponCategory:English links with redundant wikilinks#TREAD
- tread out
- tread softly, tread-softly
- tread the boards
- tread the stage
- tread water
- untrod
Related terms
Translations
to step on
to beat with one's feet; to trample
Etymology 2
From Middle EnglishCategory:English terms inherited from Middle English#TREADCategory:English terms derived from Middle English#TREAD tred, from treden (“to tread”).
Noun
tread (plural treads)Category:English lemmas#TREADCategory:English nouns#TREADCategory:English countable nouns#TREADCategory:English entries with incorrect language header#TREADCategory:Pages with entries#TREADCategory:Pages with 1 entry#TREAD
- A step taken with the foot.
- A manner of stepping.
- 1855, Alfred Tennyson, “(please specify the page)”, in Maud, and Other Poems, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC:
- She is coming, my own, my sweet; / Were it ever so airy a tread, / My heart would hear her and beat.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- The sound made when someone or something is walking.
- 1886, Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll And Mr Hyde:
- The steps fell lightly and oddly, with a certain swing, for all they went so slowly; it was different indeed from the heavy creaking tread of Henry Jekyll. Utterson sighed. "Is there never anything else?" he asked.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- 1896, Bret Harte, Barker's Luck and Other Stories:
- But when, after a singularly heavy tread and the jingle of spurs on the platform, the door flew open to the newcomer, he seemed a realization of our worst expectations.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- 1955 January, R. S. McNaught, “From the Severn to the Mersey by Great Western”, in Railway Magazine, page 19:
- As we stood waiting for the departure time with the setting sun twinkling on the great brass dome of our 2-4-0, the sound of church bells was the only one apart from the measured tread of the guard slowly pacing towards his van, and, standing at an open window, I more than once heard the fireman's "Right away!" to his mate in acknowledgement of a desultory wave of the unfurled green flag.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- (obsoleteCategory:English terms with obsolete senses#TREAD) A way; a track or path.
- c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]:
- And the queint Mazes in the wanton greene,Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
For lacke of tread are vndistinguishable.
- (constructionCategory:en:Construction#TREAD) A walking surface in a stairway on which the foot is placed.
- 1956, Anthony Burgess, Time for a Tiger (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 25:
- The dog was waiting for him, her paws on the second tread, pere regardant with a happy lolling tongue.Category:English terms with quotations#TREAD
- The grooves carved into the face of a tire, used to give the tire traction. [from 1900s]
- The grooves on the bottom of a shoe or other footwear, used to give grip or traction.
- (biologyCategory:en:Biology#TREAD) The chalaza of a bird's egg; the treadle.
- The act of avian copulation in which the male bird mounts the female by standing on her back.
- (fortification) The top of the banquette, on which soldiers stand to fire over the parapet.
- A bruise or abrasion produced on the foot or ankle of a horse that interferes, or strikes its feet together.
Synonyms
- (horizontal part of a step): run
Antonyms
Derived terms
- retread (Etymology 1)
Translations
step
manner of stepping
sound made when someone or something is walking
way, track, path
horizontal part of a step
grooves in tire
grooves in a sole
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked
Category:Entries with translation boxes#TREAD
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