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Origin and history of careen

careen(v.)

1590s, "turn a ship on its side" (with the keel exposed, for inspection, repairs, etc.), from French cariner, literally "expose a ship's keel," from French carene "keel" (16c.), from Italian (Genoese dialect) carena, from Latin carina "keel of a ship," also (and perhaps originally) "nutshell," possibly from PIE root *kar- "hard."

The intransitive sense of "lean, tilt" is from 1763 of ships; in general use by 1883. In the sense of "rush headlong," it is confused with career (v.) at least since 1923. [To career is to move rapidly; to careen is to lurch from side to side, often while moving rapidly.] Earlier figurative uses of careen were "to be laid up; to rest." Related: Careened; careening.

also from 1590s

Entries linking to careen

career(v.)

1590s, "to charge at a tournament," from career (n.). The meaning "move rapidly, run at full speed" (1640s) is from the image of a horse "passing a career" on the jousting field, etc. Related: Careered; careering.

*kar-

also *ker-, Proto-Indo-European root meaning "hard."

It might form all or part of: -ard; Bernard; cancer; canker; carcinogen; carcinoma; careen; chancre; -cracy; Gerard; hard; hardly; hardy; Leonard; Richard; standard.

It might also be the source of: Sanskrit karkatah "crab," karkarah "hard;" Greek kratos "strength," kratys "strong;" "hard;" Old English heard, German hart "solid and firm, not soft."

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    Trends of careen

    adapted from books.google.com/ngrams/ with a 7-year moving average; ngrams are probably unreliable.

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    shift
    Middle English shiften, from Old English sciftan, scyftan "arrange, place, put in order" (a sense now obsolete), also "divide, separate, partition; distribute, allot, share" (now obsolete or provincial), from Proto-Germanic *skiftan (source also of Old Norse skipta "to divide, ch
    tilt
    Old English *tyltan "to be unsteady," from tealt "unsteady," from Proto-Germanic *taltaz (source also of Old Norse tyllast "to trip," Swedish tulta "to waddle," Norwegian tylta "to walk on tip-toe," Middle Dutch touteren "to swing"). Meaning "to cause to lean, tip, slope" (1590s)
    stagger
    mid-15c., "walk unsteadily, reel" (intransitive), altered from stakeren (early 14c.), which is from a Scandinavian source (compare Old Danish stagra, Old Norse stakra "to push, shove, cause to reel," also "to stumble, stagger"), cognate with Dutch staggelen "to stagger," German s
    move
    late 13c., meven, in various senses (see below), from Anglo-French mover, Old French movoir "to move, get moving, set out; set in motion; introduce" (Modern French mouvoir), from Latin movere "move, set in motion; remove; disturb" (past participle motus, frequentative motare), fr
    churl
    Old English ceorl "peasant, one of the lowest class of freemen, man without rank," from Proto-Germanic *kerlaz, *karlaz (source also of Old Frisian zerl "man, fellow," Middle Low German kerle, Dutch kerel "freeman of low degree," German Kerl "man, husband," Old Norse karl "old ma
    lurch
    "sudden pitch to one side," 1784, from earlier lee-larches (1765), a nautical term for "the sudden roll which a ship makes to lee-ward in a high sea, when a large wave strikes her, and bears her weather-side violently up, which depresses the other in proportion" ["Complete Dictio
    swag
    "move heavily or unsteadily," 1520s, now provincial or archaic, probably from a Scandinavian source akin to Old Norse sveggja "to swing, sway," from the same source as Old English swingan "to swing" (see swing (v.)). Earlier it meant "swing an object" (c. 1400), "swing or shake f
    walk
    "travel on foot," c. 1200, a merger of two verbs, 1. Old English wealcan "to toss, roll, move round" (past tense weolc, past participle wealcen), and 2. wealcian "to roll up, curl," from Proto-Germanic *welk- (source also of Old Norse valka "to drag about," Danish valke "to full"
    rock
    [stone, mass of mineral matter], Middle English rokke, roche "stone as a substance; large rocky formation, rocky height or outcrop, crag," from Old English rocc (as in stanrocc "stone rock or obelisk") and directly from Old North French roque, variant of Old French roche, which i
    cork
    c. 1300, "the light, elastic outer bark of a species of oak tree native to Iberia and North Africa, used for many purposes," from Spanish alcorque "cork sole," probably from earlier Spanish corcho, from Latin quercus "oak" (see Quercus) or cortex (genitive corticis) "bark" (see c

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