weird sister
1
9.9
- noun
- /wɪrd ˈsɪstər/
- Archaic
:
hermana extraña
- Paroissien dropped his arm, and the curtain rose to the eerie chant of the three weird sisters rising out of the hanging smoke.
Examples
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The story included a scene where the weird sisters danced around a cauldron under a full moon.
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In Shakespeare's Macbeth, the weird sisters prophesied the fate of the main characters.
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Many believe that the weird sisters influence the destiny of heroes in ancient tales.
Synonyms
4
9.9
A goddess in Norse stories who decides the future of people and gods
A person like a witch who can say what will happen in the future
Surface Forms
Morphology
The contemporary meanings of the constituents ('weird' = strange; 'sister' = female sibling or member) do not compose to yield 'goddesses of fate' or 'the witches in Macbeth' — the relevant sense of 'weird' (Old English wyrd = fate) is archaic and literarily specific. Without cultural or literary knowledge of this historical sense, a B1 learner who knows the parts would not predict the MWE's meaning, so it is idiomatic and non-compositional for learners.
Etymology
Weird sister comes from old stories where weird once meant 'fate' and the sisters were women who controlled people's 'future'. One popular story says these 'fate' women became the witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth, so the phrase now means a woman who predicts or controls someone's future.