From Middle English blenden, either from Old English blandan, blondan, ġeblandan, ġeblendan or from Old Norse blanda (“to blend, mix”) (which was originally a strong verb with the present-tense stem blend; compare blendingr (“a blending, a mixture; a half-breed”)), whence also Danish blande, or from a blend of the Old English and Old Norse terms; both ultimately from Proto-Germanic *blandaną (“to blend; mix; combine”). Compare Middle Dutch blanden (“to mix”), Gothic 𐌱𐌻𐌰𐌽𐌳𐌰𐌽 (blandan), Old Church Slavonic блєсти (blesti, “to go astray”).
Meanings
A mixture of two or more things.
Their music has been described as a blend of jazz and heavy metal.
Our department has a good blend of experienced workers and young promise.
A word formed by combining two other words; a portmanteau word.
Blends, also known as portmanteau words, are not an original part of English. That is, none occur in Old or Middle English, nor even in Elizabethan English, with the earliest known example being the rare and now obsolete term tomaxe, a blend of tomahawk and axe. 2018, James Lambert, “A multitude of ‘lishes’: The nomenclature of hybridity”, in English World-Wide, page 10:
From Middle English blenden, either from Old English blandan, blondan, ġeblandan, ġeblendan or from Old Norse blanda (“to blend, mix”) (which was originally a strong verb with the present-tense stem blend; compare blendingr (“a blending, a mixture; a half-breed”)), whence also Danish blande, or from a blend of the Old English and Old Norse terms; both ultimately from Proto-Germanic *blandaną (“to blend; mix; combine”). Compare Middle Dutch blanden (“to mix”), Gothic 𐌱𐌻𐌰𐌽𐌳𐌰𐌽 (blandan), Old Church Slavonic блєсти (blesti, “to go astray”).
Meanings
(transitive) To mingle; to mix; to unite intimately; to pass or shade insensibly into each other.
To make hummus you need to blend chickpeas, olive oil, lemon juice and garlic.
(intransitive) To be mingled or mixed.
Sepia Delft tiles surrounded the fireplace, their crudely drawn Biblical scenes in faded cyclamen blending with the pinkish pine, while above them, instead of a mantelshelf, there was an archway high enough to form a balcony with slender balusters and a tapestry-hung wall behind. 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 3, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:
There is a tone of solemn and sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality. 1819 June 23 – 1820 September 13, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “(please specify the title)”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., New York, N.Y.: […] C[ornelius] S. Van Winkle, […], →OCLC:
Earless ghost swift moths become “invisible” to echolocating bats by forming mating clusters close[…]above vegetation and effectively blending into the clutter of echoes that the bat receives from the leaves and stems around them. Many insects probably use this strategy, which is a close analogy to crypsis in the visible world—camouflage and other methods for blending into one’s visual background. 2013 May-June, William E. Conner, “An Acoustic Arms Race”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3, pages 206–7:
To feel no other breezes than are blown / Through its tall woods with high romances blent 1817, John Keats, Happy is England!:
(obsolete) To pollute by mixture or association; to spoil or corrupt; to blot; to stain.
These stormes, which now his beauty blend,
Shall turn to calmes. 1595, Edmunde Spenser [i.e., Edmund Spenser], “[Amoretti.] Sonnet LXII”, in Amoretti and Epithalamion. […], London: […] [Peter Short] for William Ponsonby, →OCLC: