v. arch. (now chiefly poet.) [Of uncertain origin: prob. (by an unusual process) extracted from WILDERNESS on the analogy of the form of Wander; but cf. MDu. verwilderen, frequent. of verwilden (f. ver- FOR- prefix1 + wilde, wilt WILD a.), and G. wildern. It has been frequently apprehended as an aphetic f. BEWILDER (which is later in appearance), and occas. spelt ’wilder.]
1. trans. To cause to lose one’s way, as in a wild or unknown place; to lead or drive astray; refl. to lose one’s way, go astray.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage, VIII. ix. 653. Unknowne Lands, where we have wildered our selves.
a. 1620. J. Dyke, Sel. Serm. (1640), 138. They had been in danger of being wilderd, of losing their way.
1687. Dryden, Hind & P., II. 682. This she desir’d her to accept and stay, For fear she might be wilder’d in her way.
1717. Addison, trans. Ovid’s Met., III. 236. Young Actæon, wilder’d in the wood.
1796. Southey, Hymn to the Penates, 96. O ye whom Youth has wilder’d on your way.
1819. Shelley, New Nat. Anthem, iv. ’Wilder her enemies in their own dark disguise.
b. fig.; esp. to render at a loss how to act, or what to think; to perplex, bewilder.
1642. D. Rogers, Naaman, 55. Having himselfe sent for him to his house, when he was wildred.
1648–9. Eikon Bas., xv. 131. Extravagances wherewith some men have now even wildred … both Church and State.
1654. E. Johnson, Wonder-wrkg. Provid., ii. 4. You shall be left wildred with strange Revelations.
1701. Collier, M. Aurel., 259. His Understanding, being misty and misled, he was willdred in the Qualities of Things, and mistook the Nature of Good and Evil.
1811. Shelley, St. Irvyne, Pr. Wks. 1888, I. 218. Wolfstein,… wildered by the suscitated energies of his soul almost to madness. Ibid. (1816), Alastor, 139. To her cold home Wildered, and wan, and panting, she returned.
1887. Bowen, Virg. Æneid, IV. 69. Over the city she wanders, the sad Queen, wildered of thought.
2. intr. To lose one’s way, go astray, stray, wander; to be bewildered; to move or extend in a confused way.
1658. Gurnall, Chr. in Arm., II. 39. A heavy curse, did we rightly judge of it, to wander and wilder in a maze of errour.
a. 1734. North, Life Dudley North (1744), 200. He used the Room above to wilder in his Accounts.
1805. Scott, Last Minstrel, I. Introd. iv. And scenes long past of joy and pain, Came wildering o’er his aged brain.
1838. S. Bellamy, Betrayal, V. 166. A fornix vast, that rangeless from the eye Ran wildering.
1854. Lowell, Cambr. 30 Yrs. Ago, Writ. 1890, I. 96. The fierce snow-storm wildering without.
b. trans. with adv. To spend or waste in ‘wildering.’
1668. Owen, Expos. 130th Ps., 131. So he wilders away all his dayes in uncertainties.
† 3. trans. and intr. To render, or become, wild or uncivilized. Obs. rare.
1798. W. Taylor, in Monthly Mag., VI. 550. The yoke of the Egyptians had degraded the Hebrews into the rudest and worst of nations, wildered by three hundred years of neglect. Ibid. (1804), in Crit. Rev., I. 20. Her dole-lands … will again be suffered to wilder into sheep walks. Ibid. (1806), in Ann. Rev., IV. 111. European families transported to Canada must wilder in a generation or two.
