Driveth

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Archaic form meaning to push or propel something forward by force, as a person or animal does when it sends a thing onward
2. Old-fashioned verb form describing the act of forcing or urging something along a path or onward course
3. Archaic third-person form of a verb meaning to impel or thrust a thing forward with sustained force or pressure

Etymology: "Driveth" is an archaic third-person singular present form of "drive," built from the verb "drive" plus the old ending "-eth." That ending descends from Old English "-aþ," which was itself a development of the Proto-Germanic "-ōþi" and Proto-West Germanic "-ōþ." In Middle English the ending appeared as "-eth," and it was the standard way to mark the third person in writing for centuries, so "he driveth" meant the same as the modern "he drives." The verb "drive" comes from Middle English "driven," which carried the sense of forcing something onward or pushing animals along a path. The "-eth" ending was not specific to this verb; it attached to nearly every English verb in the same grammatical slot, which is why "driveth" looks so much like "loveth" or "goeth" in older texts. The form fell out of ordinary speech as "-s" spread through the language, and it survives now mainly in the King James Bible and other early modern writing.

Synonyms: propels, impels, motivates