Espied vs Descried - What's the difference?
espied | descried |
(espy)
To catch sight of; to perceive with the eyes; to discover, as a distant object partly concealed, or not obvious to notice; to see at a glance; to discern unexpectedly; to spy; as, to espy land; to espy a man in a crowd.
To inspect narrowly; to examine and keep watch upon; to watch; to observe.
* Jeremy Taylor
To look or search narrowly; to look about; to watch; to take notice; to spy.
* Bible, Jer. xlviii. 19
(descry)
To see.
To discover (a distant or obscure object) by the eye; to espy; to discern or detect.
* Shakespeare
* Milton
* 1719 (Daniel Defoe), (Robinson Crusoe)
*
, title=(The Celebrity), chapter=4
, passage=Judge Short had gone to town, and Farrar was off for a three days' cruise up the lake. I was bitterly regretting I had not gone with him when the distant notes of a coach horn reached my ear, and I descried a four-in-hand winding its way up the inn road from the direction of Mohair.}}
To discover; to disclose; to reveal.
* Milton
As verbs the difference between espied and descried
is that espied is past tense of espy while descried is past tense of descry.espied
English
Verb
(head)Anagrams
*espy
English
Verb
- He sends angels to espy us in all our ways.
- Stand by the way, and espy .
Anagrams
* * *descried
English
Verb
(head)Anagrams
*descry
English
Verb
(en-verb)- Edmund, I think, is gone to descry / The strength o' the enemy.
- And now their way to earth they had descried .
- When I had passed the vale where my bower stood
- His purple robe he had thrown aside, lest it should descry him.