![]() ![]() Merriam-Webster lists antonyms for nerve-racking, including: SynonymsĪccording to, synonyms for nerve-racking include: “Nerve,” used in this context, refers to “any of the filamentous bands of nervous tissue that connect parts of the nervous system with the other organs, conduct nerve impulses, and are made up of axons and dendrites together with protective and supportive structures.” Through our nervous system, we are able to feel sensations such as pain. Merriam-Websterdefines the word “nerve-racking” as an adjective, meaning “extremely trying on the nerves.” The dictionary provides “nerve-wracking” as a variant spelling. ![]() So the word “nerve-racking” means something like “painful to the nerves,” whereas “nerve-wracking” would mean “wrecking the nerves.” Both variants make sense, but the – rack- spelling predates the other variant and is normally preferred. By the 1580’s, it meant any number of pains. “Rack” originated with the Proto-Germanic root rak-, meaning “to move in a straight line.” The word meant “to stretch out for drying” and “to torture on the rack” in the early 1400’s. The Online Etymology Dictionary points out that, “Wrack, wreck, rack and wretch were utterly tangled in spelling and somewhat in sense in Middle and early modern English.” From these indistinguishable spellings, we have inherited a sense of confusion around whether to use nerve-racking or nerve-wracking. The verb “wrack” derives from the Proto-Germanic root wreg-, meaning “to push, shove, drive.” Before being used as a verb, “wrack” served as an English noun referring to a shipwreck. Nerve is a noun derived from the Proto-Indo-European root (s)neu-, “tendon, sinew.” That evolved through Latin ( nervus) and Old French ( nerf) to join the English lexicon as “nerve” in the late 1300’s. “Nerve-wracking” dates from 1867, as a combination of “nerve” and “wrack”. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the adjective “nerve-racking” first appeared in 1812, as a compound of two preexisting words “nerve” and “rack”.
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