Awake - awaken - wake - waken
From Hull AWE
The four verbs awake, awaken, wake and waken are obviously similar, and have a very confused history.
- Grammatical note: Awaken and waken are now regular verbs, forming both past tense and past participle by the simple addition of '-ed'. For the inflections of the others, see awake (irregular verb) and wake (irregular verb) - and note that both the irregular verbs vary their forms of the past tense and past participle. Both can use '-ed', or the ablaut change of the strong verbs with the mutation of the '-a-' to the base form into '-o-' in the past forms. (This is Quirk's class 4 Aa.)
- Historically, this arises from what OED calls "Two distinct but synonymous verbs from the same root [which] coalesced in early Middle English". These were the Old English strong verb (? wæcnan), wóc, wócon, *wacen, probably with the sense 'to become awake'; and the Old English weak verb wacian, probably meaning 'to be or remain awake'. 'Waken' and 'awaken' both currently have both transitive and intransitive meanings.
- Etymological note:::The root goes back to a hypothetical wag- or weg- in some form of proto-Indo-European, which is represented in Latin, Greek and [Sanscrit]], etc, as well as in most modern [Germanic]] languages.
- Historically, this arises from what OED calls "Two distinct but synonymous verbs from the same root [which] coalesced in early Middle English". These were the Old English strong verb (? wæcnan), wóc, wócon, *wacen, probably with the sense 'to become awake'; and the Old English weak verb wacian, probably meaning 'to be or remain awake'. 'Waken' and 'awaken' both currently have both transitive and intransitive meanings.
- Grammatical note: Awaken and waken are now regular verbs, forming both past tense and past participle by the simple addition of '-ed'. For the inflections of the others, see awake (irregular verb) and wake (irregular verb) - and note that both the irregular verbs vary their forms of the past tense and past participle. Both can use '-ed', or the ablaut change of the strong verbs with the mutation of the '-a-' to the base form into '-o-' in the past forms. (This is Quirk's class 4 Aa.)
'awaken' was strictly intransitive in Old English, although now the transitive use of waken is the usual usage.
Of more use to most users of AWE, possibly, is advice as to how to use the verbs in modern English.
- Wake is the simplest word, and acceptable in all contexts where any of the other verbs might be used. It is the only one of the four which can be used as a phrasal verb with up: the commands wake up! is common when trying to rouse a sleeper.
- "... awaken and waken are more formal or literary in effect" (on-line Fowler, 2015).
Waken and awaken are now most to be recommended for transitive use, whereas awake is most usually intransitive, and wake is uses in bothg transitive and intransitive senses.
- "He awoke to a sense of his duty"; "the crisis awakened his sense of duty"
"in the modern English period the static sense, both intransitive and transitive, [i.e. 'to be awake'] has become almost obsolete, the usual meanings of the word being 'to become or cause to become awake'." (OED).
- There is also the adjective awake (with the simple meaning 'not asleep', 'conscious'). The intensified expression 'wide awake' is common, meaning 'fully alert', 'fully conscious'.)
