wink

Etymology 1

From Middle English winken (strong verb) and Middle English winken (weak verb), from Old English wincian (“to wink, make a sign, close the eyes, blink”, weak verb), from Proto-West Germanic *winkōn (“to close one's eyes”), from Proto-Indo-European *weng- (“to bow, bend, arch, curve”). Cognate with Middle Low German winken (“to blink, wink”), German winken (“to nod, beckon, make a sign”). Related also to Saterland Frisian wäänke, Dutch wenken (“to beckon, motion”), Latin vacillare (“sway”), Lithuanian véngti (“to swerve, avoid”), Albanian vang (“tire, felloe”), Sanskrit वङ्गति (vaṅgati, “(he, she) limps”).

verb

1. (obsolete, intransitive) To close one's eyes in sleep.
2. (intransitive) To close one's eyes.
   I kept my eyes shut, after once glancing at him; and, I protest, I thought I saw him still, though I winked as close as ever I could. 1816, The Black Dwarf, Walter Scott, Chapter the Fifth
3. (intransitive) Usually followed by at: to look the other way, to turn a blind eye.
   But whenever obstinacy, which is an open defiance, appears, that cannot be winked at, or neglected, but must, in the first instance, be subdued and mastered; only care must be had, that we mistake not ; and we must be sure it is obstinacy, and nothing else. 1693, John Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, § 79
4. (intransitive) To close one's eyes quickly and involuntarily; to blink.
   The pipes began to be puffed in a silence which had an air of severity; the more important customers, who drank spirits and sat nearest the fire, staring at each other as if a bet were depending on the first man who ‘’’winked’’’ […] 1861, George, chapter VI, in Silas Marner
5. (transitive, intransitive) To blink with only one eye as a message, signal, or suggestion, usually with an implication of conspiracy. (When transitive, the object may be the eye being winked, or the message being conveyed.)
   He winked at me. She winked her eye. He winked his assent.
   Oliver saw Kit Carson wink at the lieutenant and Lucien Maxwell, as the speech reached them, and it was evident that these three leaders did not believe the Indian tales. Consequently he himself decided that the reports of "evil spirits" awaiting were all bosh. 1912, Edwin L. Sabin, chapter VIII, in With Carson and Frémont
6. (intransitive) To gleam fitfully or intermitently; to twinkle; to flicker.
   Down in the bottoms the sycamore and cottonwood are casting off their yellowing leaves; but the white oak will cling to her gorgeous finery till the blizzard comes shrieking up the gulch to wrest it from her, or until the winking prairie-fire leaps among her branches, and mounting upward to the highest limbs, finally leaves the vain beauty a blackened skeleton. 1899, Will T. Whitlock, “The Circumflex”, in Overland Monthly, Vol. XXXIII, second series
   Her kitchen is a series of Still Lives; the copper pans wink on the walls. 1920, Katherine Mansfield, Letter to Richard Murray (ca. September 19), Vincent O. Sullivan & Margaret Scott, The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield, Vol. 4 (1996)

noun

1. An act of winking (a blinking of only one eye), or a message sent by winking.
2. A brief period of sleep; especially forty winks.
   Couldn't sleep a wink last night / Oh how I'd love to hold you tight 1973, Bryan Ferry (lyrics and music), “Pyjamarama”, performed by Roxy Music
3. A brief time; an instant.
4. The smallest possible amount.
   It’s many’s the time I shot the selfsame rifiie before, and it’s many ’s the time after, but niver a wink of the same have I seen. 'T was the sight of a lifetime. 1899, Jack London, "The Men of Forty-Nine: 'Malemute Kid" Deals with a Duel," Overland Monthly, Vol. XXXIII, second series
5. A subtle allusion.
   The film includes a wink to wartime rationing.

Etymology 2

Clipping of tiddlywink.

noun

1. (tiddlywinks) Synonym of tiddlywink (“small disc used in the game of tiddlywinks”)

Etymology 3

Clipping of periwinkle.

noun

1. (chiefly Britain) Synonym of periwinkle