sneeze – English verb conjugation

Nominal Forms

Infinitive: to sneeze
Participle: sneezed
Gerund: sneezing

Cognates

See the 3 cognates of sneeze

Indicative

Subjunctive

Conditional

Imperative

you	sneeze
we	Let's sneeze
you	sneeze

Indicative

Conditional

Synonyms & Antonyms

Synonyms

to expel air as a reflex

sternutate

Additional Information

Phrasal Verbs

Etymology

1. From Middle English snesen (“to sneeze”), alteration of earlier fnesen (“to sneeze”), from Old English fnēosan (“to sneeze, snort”), from Proto-West Germanic *fneusan, from Proto-Germanic *fneusaną, from Proto-Indo-European *pnew- (“to breathe, pant, snort, sneeze”). Cognate with dialectal Dutch fniezen (“to sneeze”), Old Norse fnýsa (“to snort”).
2. Compare neeze, from Middle English nesen, from Old English *hnēosan (“to sneeze”), cognate with Old High German niosan (“to sneeze”), Old Norse hnjósa (“to sneeze”). See neeze.
3. It has been suggested that the change could be due to a misinterpretation of the uncommon initial sequence fn- as ſn- (sn- written with a long s), although the change is regular, seen also in snore and snort from Middle English fnoren and fnorten, and in late Middle English snatted from earlier Middle English fnatted (“snub-nosed”). The fn- forms of all these words fell out of use in the 1400s. Due to this rather universal adoption of the fn- > sn- shift within English by such a time frame, the idea of it being a simple sound shift has been suggested as well, with the specifically being a type of assimilation as the bilabial f- becomes alveolar s- to match the place of articulation of the following n-. See: Middle English 'snesen', Proto-Germanic '*fneusaną', Dutch 'fniezen', Old High German 'niosan'.

Verbs referencing "sneeze"

Greek, Ancient πνέω, German, old spelling niesen, Icelandic fnæsa.

Sample Sentences