haste

Etymology

Blend of Middle English hasten (verb), (compare Dutch haasten, German hasten, Danish haste, Swedish hasta (“to hasten, rush”)) and Middle English hast (“haste”, noun), from Old French haste (whence French hâte), from Old Frankish *hai(f)st (“violence”), from Proto-Germanic *haifstiz (“struggle, conflict”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱeyp- (“to ridicule, mock, anger”). Akin to Old Frisian hāst, hāste (“haste”), Old English hǣst (“violence”), Old English hǣste (“violent, impetuous, vehement”, adj), Old Norse heift／heipt (“feud”), Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌹𐍆𐍃𐍄𐍃 (haifsts, “rivalry”). Cognate with German heftig (“vehement”) and Danish heftig (“vehement”).

noun

1. Speed; swiftness; dispatch.
   We were running late so we finished our meal in haste.
   There was a stampede as the congressmen jumped the banister in their hastes to be the first to sign away their souls. 2017, Russell M. Peterson, The Armies of Forever, page 368
2. (obsolete) Urgency; sudden excitement of feeling or passion; precipitance; vehemence.

verb

1. (transitive, archaic) To urge onward; to hasten.
2. (intransitive, archaic) To move with haste.
   The city is amaz'd, for Sylla hastes / To enter Rome with fury, sword and fire. 1594, “The Wounds of Civill War”, in A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition)
   He hastes away to another, whom his affairs have called to a distant place, and, having seen the empty house, goes away disgusted by a disappointment which could not be intended, because it could not be foreseen. 1825, Samuel Johnson, The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes
   Samson hastes not; but neither does he pause to rest. 1881, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present