Old English dyde, past tense of do (v.). The only remainder in Germanic of the old linguistic pattern of forming a past tense by reduplication of the stem of the present tense. Far back in Germanic the equivalent of did was used as a suffix to make the past tenses of other verbs, hence the English -ed suffix (Old English -de).
"perform, execute, achieve, carry out, bring to pass by procedure of any kind," etc., Middle English do, first person singular of Old English don "make, act, perform, cause; to put, to place," from West Germanic *doanan (source also of Old Saxon duan, Old Frisian dwa, Dutch doen, Old High German tuon, German tun), from PIE root *dhe- "to set, put, place."
Use as an auxiliary began in Middle English. Sense of "to put, place, lay" is obsolete except in phrases such as do away with. Periphrastic form in negative sentences (They did not think) replaced the Old English negative particles (Hie ne wendon).
Meaning "visit as a tourist" is from 1817. In old slang it meant "to hoax, cheat, swindle" (1640s). Slang meaning "to do the sex act with or to" is from 1913.
Slang do in "bring disaster upon, kill" is by 1905. To have to do with "have concern or connection with" is from late 13c. To do without "dispense with" is from 1713. Expression do or die indicating determination to succeed despite dangers or obstacles is attested from 1620s.
by 1694 in plays, earlier did n't (1678); a contraction of did not.
type of toy marble, by 1905, American English, colloquial shortening of agate (q.v.).
Excited groups gather about rude circles scratched in the mud, and there is talk of "pureys," and "reals," and "aggies," and "commies," and "fen dubs!" There is a rich click about the bulging pockets of the boys, and every so often in school time something drops on the floor and rolls noisily across the room. When Miss Daniels asks: "Who did that?" the boys all look so astonished. Who did what pray tell? [McClure's magazine, May 1905]
a "bright side" which proverbially accompanies even the darkest trouble; by 1843, apparently from oft-quoted lines from Milton's "Comus," where the silver lining is the light of the moon shining from behind the cloud.
Was I deceived? or did a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night?
I did not err, there does a sable cloud,
Turn out her silver lining on the night
And casts a gleam over this tufted grove.
Thomas Warton added the commentary: "When all succour ſeems to be lost, Heaven unexpectedly presents the ſilver lining oſ a ſable cloud to the virtuous."
late 14c., in grammar, "a noun-adjective, a word having the value of an adjective as a part of speech but so regularly made from a verb and associated with it in meaning and construction as to seem to belong to the verb," from Old French participle in the grammatical sense (13c.), a variant of participe, and directly from Latin participium, literally "a sharing, partaking," also used in the grammatical sense, from particeps "sharing, partaking" (see participation). In grammatical sense, the Latin translates Greek metokhē "sharer, partaker," and the notion is of a word "partaking" of the nature of both a noun and an adjective.
Owl: "What a scene! A octopus got me!"
Bug: "Phoo! ain’t no octopus is got him!"
Pogo: "Mebbe he mean a octopus did got him."
Bug: "A octopus did got him? Is that grammatiwackle?"
Pogo; "As grammacklewak as rain — ‘is got’ is the present aloofable tense an’ ‘did got’ is the part particuticle."
Bug: "Mighty strange! My teachers allus learnt me that the past inconquerable tense had a li’l’ more body to it."
popular name for a large, green locust-like insect, 1784, American English, imitative of the stridulous sound the male makes when it vibrates its wings. In the eastern U.S., a familiar sound of a summer night; the sound itself was more accurately transcribed in 1751 as catedidist.
[T]heir noise is loud and incessant, one perpetually and regularly answering the other in notes exactly similar to the words Katy did, or Katy Katy did, repeated by one, and another immediately bawls out Katy didn't, or Katy Katy didn't. In this loud clamour they continue without ceasing until the fall of the leaf, when they totally disappear. [J.F.D. Smyth, "A Tour in the United States of America," 1784]
objective case of who, Old English hwam (Proto-Germanic *hwam), dative form of hwa (from PIE root *kwo-, stem of relative and interrogative pronouns). Ungrammatical use of who for whom is attested from c. 1300.
The clerk snapped at Degarmo's back like a terrier.
"One moment, please. Whom did you wish to see?"
Degarmo spun on his heel and looked at me wonderingly. "Did he say 'whom'?"
"Yeah, but don't hit him," I said. "There is such a word."
Degarmo licked his lips. "I knew there was," he said. "I often wondered where they kept it."
[Raymond Chandler, "The Lady in the Lake," 1943.]
