Thumbed

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To have manipulated or examined something, often a book or a stack of papers, using the thumb for paging through
2. To have shown favoritism or partiality towards someone or something, often implying a biased opinion or attitude
3. To have turned pages or items quickly and carelessly, often resulting in wear or damage to the material

Etymology: The most surprising link here is that "thumb" is a doublet of "tomb." Both descend from a Proto-Germanic root meaning "to swell," and the Greek cognate "tumbos" meant "burial mound." The swelling sense survives in the thumb itself, the thick digit that sits apart from the fingers. Old English had "thūma," and the word has been "thumb" since Middle English, when a parasitic "b" crept in during the late 13th century, as it did in "tomb" from the same root. Cognates across the Germanic languages, from Dutch "duim" to German "Daumen," keep the thumb's name, and in several of them the same word also means "inch," the width of a thick digit. To thumb something is to handle it repeatedly with the thumb, as one does when flipping pages. Used of books and documents, "thumbed" describes the softened, dog-eared, grubby state that repeated handling leaves behind.

Synonyms: flipped, perused