meaning - Awake or Awaken Which one is correct?

• Were you awaken at 1 am yesterday?

Is this grammatically correct? Can you tell me meaning of awake properly? How is it used as Adj., and as verb by giving some examples?

• I awoke at 11 am today.

Is this correct? Actually, What is the difference between wake and awake? I have searched a lot on Google but all in vain. I am not getting their difference.

Answer

Awake has two meanings:

• 
  

  As an adjective it describes a person or animal's state. It may only be used as a predicate adjective, in the predicate of a clause, not as an attributive adjective before a noun:

  
  

  
  

  ^ok John is awake and at work.
  ^∗  Awake John is at work.

  
  

  
  


• 
  

  As a verb it is intransitive—it takes no object—and means “to become awake (adj)”. It is an irregular verb, with the past form awoke; two different past/past participles are in use, awoken and awaked:

  
  

  
  
  

  I awake at four o'clock most mornings.
  I awoke at six o’clock this morning.
  I have awoken/awakened early only twice this month.

  
  

  
  

Awaken is a transitive verb requiring a direct object. It means “cause [someone or something] to become awake”. It is a regular verb: both the past and past participle forms are awakened:

My wife awakens me if I oversleep.
My wife awakened me at seven o’clock.

He was awakened by a loud crash.

The verb wake, woke, woken/wakened is also used in both transitive and intransitive senses.

I woke at four o’clock.
My wife woke me at four o’clock.
I was wakened at four o’clock.

In pre-20th-century texts wake may also have another meaning: to “stay awake”.

These verb uses are fairly complicated; but it is simplified by the fact that none of them are used much in colloquial English today (which is one reason why the past and participle forms are so variable). Instead, the phrasal verb wake up (past woke, past participle woken) is used in both transitive and intransitive senses:

I wake up at four most mornings.
My wife woke me up at seven o’clock.
He was woken up by a loud crash.

You will need to recognize the different forms and meanings in your reading; but for your own work you can use wake up in any context or register.

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^∗  marks an utterance as ungrammatical