hard

pronunciation

How to pronounce hard in British English: UK [hɑːd] word uk audio image

How to pronounce hard in American English: US [hɑːrd] word us audio image

Adjective:

not easy; requiring great physical or mental effort to accomplish or comprehend or endure
metaphorically hard
not yielding to pressure or easily penetrated
very strong or vigorous
characterized by toilsome effort to the point of exhaustion; especially physical effort
of speech sounds
of a drinker or drinking; indulging intemperately
having undergone fermentation
having a high alcoholic content
unfortunate or hard to bear
dried out
Adverb:

with effort or force or vigor
with firmness
earnestly or intently
causing great damage or hardship
slowly and with difficulty
indulging excessively
into a solid condition
very near or close in space or time
with pain or distress or bitterness
to the full extent possible; all the way

Word Origin

hard: hard: [OE] Hard comes ultimately from a prehistoric Indo-European *krátus, which denoted ‘power, strength’. This original meaning was carried over into Greek krátos ‘strength, power, authority’ (source of the ending -cracy in such English words as democracy and plutocracy), but the Germanic languages took it over mainly in the sense ‘resistant to physical pressure’.The prehistoric Germanic form *kharthuz produced, besides English hard, German hart, Dutch hard, Swedish hård, and Danish haard. The sense ‘difficult’, incidentally, developed in the 14th and 15th century from the notion ‘resistant to one’s efforts’. A Germanic derived verb *kharthjan ‘harden’ was borrowed into Old French as hardir ‘embolden’, and its past participle hardi ‘bold’ reached English as hardy [13].Its main modern sense, ‘robust, tough’, presumably a harking back to its distant English relative hard, developed in the 16th century.=> hardy

hard (adj.): Old English heard "solid and firm, not soft," also, "difficult to endure, carried on with great exertion," also, of persons, "severe, rigorous, harsh, cruel," from Proto-Germanic *hardu- (cognates: Old Saxon hard, Old Frisian herd, Dutch hard, Old Norse harðr "hard," Old High German harto "extremely, very," German hart, Gothic hardus "hard"), from PIE *kortu- (cognates: Greek kratos "strength," kratys "strong"), suffixed form of root *kar-/*ker- "hard." Meaning "difficult to do" is from c. 1200. Of water, in reference to the presence of mineral salts, 1650s; of consonants, 1775. Hard of hearing preserves obsolete Middle English sense of "having difficulty in doing something." In the sense "strong, spiritous, fermented" from 1789 (as in hard cider, etc.), and this use probably is the origin of that in hard drugs (1955). Hard facts is from 1853; hard news in journalism is from 1918. Hard copy (as opposed to computer record) is from 1964; hard disk is from 1978; the computer hard drive is from 1983. Hard times "period of poverty" is from 1705. Hard money (1706) is specie, as opposed to paper. Hence 19c. U.S. hard (n.) "one who advocates the use of metallic money as the national currency" (1844). To play hard to get is from 1945. Hard rock as a pop music style recorded from 1967. To do something the hard way is from 1907.