afeard - From Ulster to America
Source: From Ulster to America: The Scotch-Irish Heritage of American English
Author: Michael Montgomery
Comments: From Ulster to America recounts the lasting impact eighteenth-century settlers from Ulster have made on the development of the English language of the United States. The book documents over 500 vocabulary items contributed to American English by these ‘Scotch-Irish’ settlers. Each ‘shared’ term with its meaning is authenticated by quotations from both sides of the Atlantic. This searchable online version of his book takes its text from the dictionary part of the second edition published by the Ullans Press in 2017.
afeard, afeared, afeered predicate adj Afraid, frightened. Same as feard. [< Middle English afered < Old English afæred, past participle of afæran, attested since c1000; dare afear(e)d adj ‘afraid’ once widespread in the U.S., but now somewhat old-fashioned, chiefly South and Midland]
Ulst.:
1801 Bruce Poems 44 Is there ony proud Laird, / To mak ye afeard, / To wham ye maun haud off yer hat.
1840 Boyce Shandy Maguire 6 Am not afeered to say mony a guid wallet o’ siller, I hae carried ahint me in the wee-bit saddle-bags.
1845 Carleton Irish Peasantry 14 May the holy Mother keep and guard us, Ned, but I’m afeard that’s no Christian crather, at all at all!
1895 MacManus Leadin’ Road 111 Masther, sir, it’s afeared I am that I’m not able to make more of it.
1931 Bratton Turf Fire 20 Whatever other people might think about ghosts, I wasn’t afeared of them anyway.
1981 Pepper Ulster-English Dict 7 She’s afeard of her own skin.
U.S.:
1843 Hall New Purchase 227 [It] sker’d Pete … so powerful he was afeer’d to come down.
1871 Eggleston Hoosier Schoolmaster 128 ‘Well, I’ll gin you the upper side, but come on’, cried Bud, ‘ef you a’n’t afeared to fight somebody besides a poor, little, sickly baby or a crippled soldier’.
1937 Hall Coll I ain’t nary bit afeared of him.
1989 Smith Flyin’ Bullets 244 That Charles had a lot of nerve, he wasn’t afeared of them in the least bit.
