wave

Etymology 1

From Middle English waven, from Old English wafian (“to wave, fluctuate, waver in mind, wonder”), from Proto-West Germanic *wabōn, from Proto-Germanic *wabōną, *wabjaną (“to wander, sway”), from Proto-Indo-European *webʰ- (“to move to and from, wander”). Cognate with Middle High German waben (“to wave”), German wabern (“to waft”), Icelandic váfa (“to fluctuate, waver, doubt”). See also waver.

verb

1. (intransitive) To move back and forth repeatedly and somewhat loosely.
   The flag waved in the gentle breeze.
   But the World Cup winning veteran's left boot was awry again, the attempt sliced horribly wide of the left upright, and the saltires were waving aloft again a moment later when a long pass in the England midfield was picked off to almost offer up a breakaway try. October 1, 2011, Tom Fordyce, “Rugby World Cup 2011: England 16-12 Scotland”, in BBC Sport
2. (intransitive) To move one’s hand back and forth (generally above the shoulders) in greeting or departure.
   I raised my arms in a final salute. I smiled. I waved goodbye. I turned into the helicopter, the door was closed, the red carpet was rolled up. 1978, Richard Nixon, RN: the Memoirs of Richard Nixon, Grosset & Dunlap, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 1090
3. (transitive, metonymically) To call attention to, or give a direction or command to, by a waving motion, as of the hand; to signify by waving; to beckon; to signal; to indicate.
   I waved goodbye from across the room.
4. (intransitive) To have an undulating or wavy form.
5. (transitive) To raise into inequalities of surface; to give an undulating form or surface to.
6. (transitive) To produce waves to the hair.
7. (intransitive, baseball) To swing and miss at a pitch.
   Jones waves at strike one.
8. (transitive) To cause to move back and forth repeatedly.
   The starter waved the flag to begin the race.
9. (transitive, metonymically) To signal (someone or something) with a waving movement.
10. (intransitive, obsolete) To fluctuate; to waver; to be in an unsettled state.
11. (intransitive, ergative) To move like a wave, or by floating; to waft.
    But in the last, this dotted line, by the twisting as well as the bending of the horn, is changed from the waving into the serpentine line 1803, William Hogarth, Anecdotes of Mr. Hogarth: And Explanatory Descriptions of the Plates of Hogarth Restored, page 137
    the flowers will not bloom less brightly, nor the grass be less green and fresh because it is waving over the head of one who loved to look upon their tender beauty while living. 1850, Pierce Egan, Robin Hood and Little John: or, The merry men of Sherwood forest, page 272
    The cypresslike ferns were not waving over these, as they waved over the corals in the wood, but the little spleenwort, called Wall-rue, was resolved that their tomb should not be without verdure. 1851, Margaret Plues, Rambles in Search of Ferns, page 31
    The moonlight fell into the room, and the shadows waved over him 1866, John Saunders, Bound to the Wheel, page 89
    Walking through the fields, where the maize was now waving over his head, pale gold with a froth of white, the sharp dead leaves scything crisply against the wind, he could see nothing but that black foetid hut 1951, Doris Lessing, “The Second Hut”, in African Stories, published 2014, page 82
    A chill waved over my consciousness as my worst nightmare erupted into reality. 1997, Elizabeth Barrett, Victoria Bovard, And His Love Shown Down, page 88
    The two stood in the window peering down where parents moved across grass, pointing tongues of colour waving over them. 2015, Arthur Calder-Marshall, About Levy

Etymology 2

From Middle English *wave, partially from waven (“to fluctuate, wave”) (see above) and partially from Middle English wawe, waghe (“wave”), from Old English wǣg (“a wave, billow, motion, water, flood, sea”), from Proto-Germanic *wēgaz (“motion, storm, wave”), from Proto-Indo-European *weǵʰ- (“to drag, carry”). Cognate with North Frisian weage (“wave, flood, sea”), German Woge (“wave”), French vague (“wave”) (from Germanic), Gothic 𐍅𐌴𐌲𐍃 (wēgs, “a wave”). See also waw.

noun

1. A moving disturbance in the level of a body of liquid; an undulation.
   The wave traveled from the center of the lake before breaking on the shore.
   The new sea wall may stop the waves from the sea, but not from the children who enthusiastically greet our train as it passes. It's great to see this ages-old habit is still going strong. December 2 2020, Paul Bigland, “My weirdest and wackiest Rover yet”, in Rail, page 65
2. (poetic) The ocean.
   1895, Fiona Macleod (William Sharp), The Sin-Eater and Other Tales […] your father Murtagh Ross, and his lawful childless wife, Dionaid, and his sister Anna—one and all, they lie beneath the green wave or in the brown mould.
3. (physics) A moving disturbance in the energy level of a field.
   Gravity waves, while predicted by theory for decades, have been notoriously difficult to detect.
4. A shape that alternatingly curves in opposite directions.
   Her hair had a nice wave to it.
   sine wave
5. Any of a number of species of moths in the geometrid subfamily Sterrhinae, which have wavy markings on the wings.
6. A loose back-and-forth movement, as of the hands.
   He dismissed her with a wave of the hand.
7. (figurative) A sudden, but temporary, uptick in something.
   A wave of shoppers stampeded through the door when the store opened for its Christmas discount special.
   A wave of retirees began moving to the coastal area.
   A wave of emotion overcame her when she thought about her son who was killed in battle.
   Foster had been left unsighted by Scott Dann's positioning at his post, but the goalkeeper was about to prove his worth to Birmingham by keeping them in the game with a series of stunning saves as West Ham produced waves after wave of attack in their bid to find a crucial second goal. January 11, 2011, Jonathan Stevenson, “West Ham 2 - 1 Birmingham”, in BBC
8. (video games, by extension) One of the successive swarms of enemies sent to attack the player in certain games.
   As the player eliminates each wave of 55 aliens, the next wave begins lower than the one previous. 2011, Raffaele Cecco, Supercharged JavaScript Graphics: With HTML5 Canvas, JQuery, and More
9. (usually "the wave") A group activity in a crowd imitating a wave going through water, where people in successive parts of the crowd stand and stretch upward, then sit.

verb

1. To generate a wave.
   If the electron had wavelike properties, then what was disturbing the medium in which the wave existed? What was waving? 2021, Michio Kaku, The God Equation

Etymology 3

See waive.

verb

1. Obsolete spelling of waive