LIEF • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Lief

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noun

Lief n. Same as Lif.

Lief n. A dear one; a sweetheart. (Obs.)

adjective

Lief adj. (Written also lieve)

Dear; beloved. (Obs., except in poetry.) "My liefe mother." "My liefest liege." "As thou art lief and dear."

Note: (Used with a form of the verb to be, and the dative of the personal pronoun.) Pleasing; agreeable; acceptable; preferable. (Obs.) See Lief, adv., and Had as lief, under Had. "Full lief me were this counsel for to hide." "Death me liefer were than such despite."

Willing; disposed. (Obs.) "I am not lief to gab." "He up arose, however lief or loth."

adverb

Lief adv. Gladly; willingly; freely; now used only in the phrases, had as lief, and would as lief; as, I had, or would, as lief go as not. "All women liefest would Be sovereign of man's love." "I had as lief the town crier spoke my lines." "Far liefer by his dear hand had I die." Note: The comparative liefer with had or would, and followed by the infinitive, either with or without the sign to, signifies prefer, choose as preferable, would or had rather. In the 16th century rather was substituted for liefer in such constructions in literary English, and has continued to be generally so used. See Had as lief, Had rather, etc., under Had.

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Etymology of 'Lief'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Lief" Quotes from Famous Books

... a name they have given me, because when they drag me into a wineshop it is cassis I always take. I had as lief be called Cadet-Cassis ...

— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... hundred knights with the Table Round, then king Arthur made great joy for their coming, and that rich present, and said openly, This fair lady is passing welcome unto me, for I have loved her long, and therefore there is nothing so lief to me. And these knights with the Round Table please me more than right great riches. And in all haste the king let ordain for the marriage and the coronation in the most honourablest wise that could be devised. Now Merlin, said ...

— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock

... You would as lief, then, have this wood you gather, This dead wood, as a green tree ...

— The Lamp and the Bell • Edna St. Vincent Millay

... loved to stick round home as much as any cat you ever see in your life. He used to say he'd as lief have a tooth pulled as go away anywheres. Always got sick, he said, when he went away, and never sick when he didn't. Pretty nigh killed himself goin' about lecterin' two or three winters,—talkin' in cold country lyceums,—as he used to say,—goin' home to cold parlors and bein' treated ...

— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various

... Scede-lands. Such wise shall a youngling with wealth be a-working 20 With goodly fee-gifts toward the friends of his father, That after in eld-days shall ever bide with him, Fair fellows well-willing when wendeth the war-tide, Their lief lord a-serving. By praise-deeds it shall be That in each and all kindreds a man shall have thriving. Then went his ways Scyld when the shapen while was, All hardy to wend him to the lord and his warding: Out then did they bear him to the side of the sea-flood, The dear fellows of ...

— The Tale of Beowulf - Sometime King of the Folk of the Weder Geats • Anonymous

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