Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun See wend and go.
  • noun An obsolete preterit and past participle of ween.
  • noun A turn or change of course; a turning or veering; hence, a rolling or tossing about.
  • noun A course; a passage; a path.
  • noun A furlong of land.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • imp. & p. p. of wend; -- now obsolete except as the imperfect of go, with which it has no etymological connection. See go.
  • noun obsolete Course; way; path; journey; direction.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Simple past of go.
  • verb nonstandard Past participle of go
  • verb archaic Simple past tense and past participle of wend.
  • noun obsolete A course; a way, a path; a journey.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English wende, past tense and past participle of wendan, to go.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Originally the past tense of wend.

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Examples

  • 'You see… after those pics in the newspapers… of you giving Katya the kiss of life… after that… see… we were flooded… simply flooded… with inquiries… and all the cheaper seats went in a flash… and the reception tickets, too… all went…'

    Smokescreen Francis, Dick 1972

  • The mother and son were very near one to the other, close in their sympathies, and there can be but little doubt that the thoughts of the mother as she was struck went out, and perhaps _went strongly out_, to her boy who was now away from home.

    The Higher Powers of Mind and Spirit Ralph Waldo Trine 1912

  • "_And she went -- and she went_!" rumbled Pat in the bass.

    The Love Affairs of Pixie George de Horne Vaizey 1887

  • Denum æðeling tō yppan, _the prince_ (Bēowulf), _honored by the Danes, went to the high seat_, 1815; ēode ... under inwit-hrōf, 3124; pl. þǣr swīðferhðe sittan ēodon, 493; ēodon him þā tōgēanes, _went to meet him_,

    Beowulf Robert Sharp 1879

  • Denum äðeling tô yppan, _the prince_ (Beówulf), _honored by the Danes, went to the high seat_, 1815; eode ... under inwit-hrôf, 3124; pl. þær swîðferhðe sittan eodon, 493; eodon him þâ tôgeánes, _went to meet him_,

    Beowulf Robert Sharp 1879

  • If any Chriftian went to any Corner of the Worlds how far fbever diftant, where there ware Chriftians; and i£ he was ihftru&ed with Commendatory Letters, by thofe from. whom he went* he was forthwith Admitted to Communion with thofe to whom he came.

    The Reasonableness of a Toleration: Enquir'd Into, Purely on Church ... 1705

  • went in the morning, went thro* the warren about Weft Dean; here he dropt, Sir Harry LiddelJ, down to Benderton; from here Lord Harry funk, up to Bender, ton Down to the Hay's bufhes,

    Sporting Magazine 1796

  • I went 30 dollars over budget last month and I don’t even know where some of it went…

    j-gan Diary Entry j-gan 2004

  • R&S gradually lost steam, moseying along till the early 00s, at which point the label went on indefinite hiatus.

    Dance music gets nostalgic: the disco and rave reissue boom 2011

  • Eventually, Duke provided me second-year students to help with each of my classes, but as the term went on, that volunteer tutor system broke down.

    Hope Unseen Captain Scott M. Smiley 2010

Comments

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  • Aside from "be", which, as I am told, is irregular in every language but Quechua (this may or may not be correct), there is only one verb in the English language which has completely different stems for two of its tenses or cases. There are significant changes in vowel (i.e. see vs. saw) and sometimes a single consonant gets changed around a bit (i.e. have vs. had) but only in go does the past tense change to something completely different: went.

    I am told that there used to be a lot more of these in English, but most of them dropped out. (There are still plenty in languages such as Greek.)

    Interestingly, went appears to come to us by way of wend, or maybe wended. This can be seen in the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales:

    And specially from every shires ende

    Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende,

    The hooly blisful martir for to seke...

    March 20, 2009

  • I can't think of any other former suppletive verbs, even in Old English; but in Present-day English you might choose to include 'must', which for past tense has to switch to 'had to'.

    March 20, 2009

  • What about "Wendt", as in "George"?

    March 20, 2009