awheel

English

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Indo-European *h₂en-der.

Proto-Germanic *an

Proto-West Germanic *ana

Old English on

Middle English an

Middle English a-

English a-

Proto-Indo-European *kʷelh₁-redup.

Proto-Indo-European *-os

Proto-Indo-European *kʷekʷléh₂

Proto-Germanic *hweulō

Old English hwēol

Middle English whel

English wheel

English awheel

From a- + wheel.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /əˈwiːl/, /əˈʍiːl/
• Rhymes: -iːl

Adverb

awheel (not comparable)

1. (dated) Riding a bicycle.
   • 1944 January and February, E. R. McCarter, “The Cairn Valley Light Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 48:

     Before the war, I used often to put my "bike" on the 12.20 p.m. (Saturdays only) and cover quite a lot of ground a-wheel before returning by another "Saturdays only" train leaving Moniaive about 10 p.m.

   • 2009 February 16, “Keeping it Reeled In”, in Bike Snob NYC‎^[1], retrieved 26 August 2012:

     Originally we were supposed to conduct the interview on bikes (or "awheel" as the British say)

2. (dated) Travelling by a wheeled vehicle.
   • 1927 October 1, Johnson, “Talk of the Town”, in New Yorker:

     […] an observer at large who chanced to be at the corner of Fourteenth Street and Seventh Avenue late one night when the traffic signals brought to a halt the few taxis that were awheel then.

3. (poetic) Circling; moving in the shape of a wheel.
   • 1983, Poul Anderson, “The Sorrow of Odin the Goth”, in Time Patrolman (Sci-fi), Tom Doherty, →ISBN:

     Its light glimmered on the river and on the wings of carrion fowl awheel overhead.

References

• “awheel”, in Collins English Dictionary, 2011–present.
• “awheel”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.