Other forms: swelling, swollen, swelled, swells
A swell is the long rolling waves left after a distant storm. A heavy swell, the swell picked up, swell from the west.
Swell travels far beyond the wind that made it, sorting itself into long even waves — which is why surfers watch storms thousands of miles away. It is distinguished from wind waves, which are short and choppy and local. As a verb, to swell is to grow bigger, and in dated American slang swell means excellent. Note swelling.
1nounswellLong rolling waves left after a distant storm.
“The boat rocked gently on the long ocean swell.”
2verbgrowTo grow bigger.
“Her ankle began to swell after she twisted it.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
swell is a wave pattern, or a growing.
Old English swellan is Germanic with no certain earlier origin. The sea sense and the growing sense are the same word, both about increase.
Proto-Germanic
*swellaną — to swell
Proto-West Germanic
*swellan
Old English
swellan — to swell
Middle English
swellen
English, today
swell
From Middle English swellen, from Old English swellan (“to swell”), from Proto-West Germanic swellan, from Proto-Germanic swellaną (“to swell”), of unknown origin. Cognate with stq swälle (“to swell”), West Frisian swolle (“to swell”), Dutch zwellen (“to swell”), Low German swellen (“to swell”), German schwellen (“to swell”), Swedish svälla (“to swell”), Icelandic svella. The adjective may derive from the noun.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA