wort
/wɝt/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.88 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
Now chiefly as the second element in the names of plants: a plant used for food or medicine.
Archaic
noun
Chiefly in the plural: a plant of the genus Brassica used as a vegetable; a brassica; especially, a cabbage (Brassica oleracea).
noun
A non-vascular plant growing on land from the division Anthocerotophyta (the hornworts) or Marchantiophyta (liverworts); an anthocerotophyte or marchantiophyte.
Example Sentences
- "[T]he people of his citye, […] shulde be norysshed with barly brede and cakes of whete, and that the residue of their diete shulde be salte, olyues, chese, and likes, and more ouer wortes that the feldes do brynge furthe, for their potage."
- "[H]e [a poor person] drinks vvater, and liue's of vvort leaues, pulſe, like a hog, or ſcraps like a dog, […]"
- "It is an excellent pleaſure to be able to take pleaſure in vvorts and vvater, in bread and onions; […]"
- "Two saints are credited with giving St. John's wort its name. One was St. John of Jerusalem, who used the wort (plant) during the crusades to heal his knights' battlefield wounds, and the other was John the Baptist."
- "VVhy (ſay they in ſcorne and contempt of povertie) here is the ſtem of a vvoort ſo vvell grovvne, here is a cabbage ſo thriven and fed, that a poore mans boord vvill not hold it."
- "I am poore / And may expect a vvorſe; yet digging, pruning, / Mending of broken vvayes, carrying of vvater, / Planting of VVorts, and Onyons, any thing / That's honeſt, and a mans, Ile rather chooſe, […]"
Etymology
PIE word *wréh₂ds From Middle English wort, wurt, wyrte (“any herb or plant; herb or plant used as food or medicine; (specifically) cabbage or vegetable of the genus Brassica; (chiefly plural) dish of cooked vegetables”) [and other forms], from Old English wyrt (“a plant; vegetable; herb, spice”) [and other forms], from Proto-West Germanic *wurti (“a root; a spice”), from Proto-Germanic *wrōts (“a root”), from Proto-Indo-European *wréh₂ds (“a root”). Doublet of root and related to orchard. Cognates * Old Dutch wort (“herb; plant”) (Middle Dutch wort (“herb; root”)) * Old High German wurz (“herb; root; spice”) (Middle High German wurz, modern German Wurz) * Old Norse jurt, urt (“herb”) (Icelandic jurt, Norwegian urt, Old Danish urt (modern Danish urt), Old Swedish yrt (“plant”) (modern Swedish ört)) * Old Saxon wurt (“herb; plant; root”) (Middle Low German wort, wurt)
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: wort, wyrt, *wurti, *wrōts, *wréh₂ds, wurt
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /wɝt/
- British English: /wɜːt/
Usage
Inflected Forms
Derived Forms
Phrases
adder's wort
birthwort (Aristolochia,
bishop's-wort
clown's ringwort
dragon's wort
dropwort *
earwort *
hog's wort