How is "winded" pronounced in "he winded a horn"?

Either "wɪnd" or "waɪnd" is acceptable, according to Dictionary.com, but merely being acceptable doesn't satisfy me. "Wɪnd" seems better to me, due to the connotation of blowing wind, etc, but apparently "waɪnd" is preferred, being listed first. Which was originally intended? (Or does it really not matter?)


According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the pronunciations /waind/ and /wihnd/ are used to indicate different verbs. They write:

Etymology: < wind n.1 In ordinary prose use the pronunciation is /wɪnd/ except in sense 3, where it is /waɪnd/

The sense 3 that they give is:

trans. To sound by forcing the breath through, to blow (a wind-instrument, esp. a horn).

So the wind in respects to a horn would be waɪnd.


If your question is: was wind (blow a musical instrument) originally pronounced like wind (wind up a clock) or wind (as in wind and rain), I believe the answer is both. Merriam-Webster dates this usage to 1586, shortly before Shakespeare started writing plays. William Shakespeare repeatedly rhymed wind (as in wind and rain) with find and kind, which I assume would also rhyme with wind (wind up a clock), as they do today.

Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell,
Pointing to each his thunder, rain and wind,
Or say with princes if it shall go well,
By oft predict that I in heaven find:

The pronunciation has changed since, so the sonnet no longer rhymes.


There has been a vowel shift in English.. See. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift looking at the table, in Shakespeare’s time the “i” was transitioning from /iː/ to /aɪ/ but we do not know if it was still a long vowel or already a diphthong /iː/ /ei/ /ɛi/ /aɪ/

Still, this does not explain why in the meaning of “blowing” it remained short, while in the meaning of “turning” it became long..