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wit

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

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See also: Appendix:Variations of "wit"

Translingual

Etymology

Abbreviation of English Wintu or Wintu wintʰu·h.

Symbol

wit

  1. (international standards, obsolete) Former ISO 639-3 language code for Wintu.

See also

English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Middle English wit, from Old English witt (“understanding, intellect, sense, knowledge, consciousness, conscience”), from Proto-West Germanic *witi, from Proto-Germanic *witją (“knowledge, reason”), from Proto-Indo-European *weyd- (“see, know”).

Cognate with Dutch wit (“knowledge”), German Witz (“joke; wit, humour”), Danish vid (“wit”), Norwegian Bokmål, Swedish vett (“wit”), Gothic 𐌿𐌽𐍅𐌹𐍄𐌹 (unwiti, “ignorance”), Latin vīdī (“see (pf.)”), Bulgarian вям (vjam, “to know”), Russian ве́дать (védatʹ, “to know”), Sanskrit विद्या (vidyā, “knowledge, wisdom”). Compare wise.

Noun

wit (countable and uncountable, plural wits)

  1. (now usually in the plural) Sanity.
    He's gone completely out of his wits.
  2. (obsolete, usually in the plural) The senses.
  3. Intellectual ability; faculty of thinking, reasoning.
    Where she has gone to is beyond the wit of man to say.
  4. The ability to think quickly; mental cleverness, especially under short time constraints.
    My father had a quick wit and a steady hand.
  5. Intelligence; common sense.
    The opportunity was right in front of you, and you didn't even have the wit to take it!
    • 15th c., “[The Creation]”, in Wakefield Mystery Plays; Re-edited in George England, Alfred W. Pollard, editors, The Towneley Plays (Early English Text Society Extra Series; LXXI), London: […] Oxford University Press, 1897, →OCLC, page 6, lines 174–179:
      I gif the witt, I gif the strenght, / of all thou sees, of brede & lengthe; / thou shall be wonder wise. / Myrth and Ioy to haue at will, / All thi likyng to fulfill, / and dwell in paradise.
      I give thee consciousness, I give thee strength over all thou seest, over all its breadth and length thou shalt be wondrously wise. Mirth and joy [you shall] have at will to fulfil all thy liking and dwell in paradise.
    • c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene ii:
      Wel, wel (Meander) thou art deepely read:
      And hauing thee, I haue a iewell ſure:
      Go on my Lord, and giue your charge I ſay,
      Thy wit wil make vs Conquerors to day.
    • 1609, William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 23”, in Shake-speares Sonnets. […], London: By G[eorge] Eld for T[homas] T[horpe] and are to be sold by William Aspley, →OCLC:
      O, learn to read what silent love hath writ:
      To hear with eyes belongs to love's fine wit.
  6. Humour, especially when clever or quick.
    The best man's speech was hilarious, full of wit and charm.
    • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XVIII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 152:
      Wit is just as much put upon—blamed for a thousand impertinences over which it would not have held for a moment its glittering shield; it is like the radiant fairy doomed to wander over earth, concealed and transformed, and only allowed on rare occasions to shine forth in its true and sparkling form. It is well that wit is an impalpable and ethereal substance, or it must long since have evaporated in indignation at that peculiarly wretched and mistaken race, its imitators.
    • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter VIII, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
      The humor of my proposition appealed more strongly to Miss Trevor than I had looked for, and from that time forward she became her old self again; […] . Our table in the dining-room became again the abode of scintillating wit and caustic repartee, Farrar bracing up to his old standard, and the demand for seats in the vicinity rose to an animated competition.
    • 1996 February 4, Jennifer Crittenden, “Scenes from the Class Struggle in Springfield”, in The Simpsons, season 7, episode 14, production code 3F13:
      Evelyn Peters: "Don't worry, Marge. Her idea of wit is nothing more than an incisive observation humorously phrased and delivered with impeccable timing".
    • 1991 September, Stephen Fry, chapter 1, in The Liar, London: Heinemann, →ISBN, section III, page 26:
      […] the cemetery – which people of shattering wit like Sampson never tired of calling ‘the dead centre of town’ […]
  7. A person who tells funny anecdotes or jokes; someone witty.
    Your friend is quite a wit, isn't he?
    • 1601, Ben Jonson, Poetaster or The Arraignment: […], London: […] [R. Bradock] for M[atthew] L[ownes] […], published 1602, →OCLC, Act III:
      Tuc[ca]. […] Can thy Author doe it impudently enough? / Hiſt[rio]. O, I warrant you, Captaine: and ſpitefully inough too; he ha's one of the moſt ouerflowing villanous wits, in Rome. He will ſlander any man that breathes; If he diſguſt him. / Tucca. I'le know the poor, egregious, nitty Raſcall; and he haue ſuch commendable Qualities, I'le cheriſh him: […]
    • 1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “The Author’s Oeconomy and Happy Life among the Houyhnhnms. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume II, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part IV (A Voyage to the Houyhnhnms), page 301:
      […] here were no Gibers, Cenſurers, Backbiters, Pick-pockets, Highwaymen, Houſebreakers, Attorneys, Bawds, Buffoons, Gameſters, Politicians, Wits, ſplenetick tedious Talkers, Controvertiſts, Raviſhers, Murderers, Robbers, Virtuoſo's; […]
Synonyms
Derived terms
Translations

See also

(type of humor):

Etymology 2

From Middle English witen, from Old English witan, from Proto-West Germanic *witan, from Proto-Germanic *witaną, from Proto-Indo-European *weyd- (“see, know”).

Cognate with North Frisian waase, wed, weet (“to know”), Saterland Frisian wíete (“to know”), West Frisian wite, witte (“to know”), Alemannic German wüsse (“to know”), Cimbrian bizzan (“to know”), Dutch, Low German weten (“to know”), German wissen (“to know”), Luxembourgish wëssen (“to know”), Yiddish וויסן (visn, “to know”), Danish vide (“to know”), Elfdalian witå (“to know”), Faroese, Icelandic vita (“to know”), Jutish veer (“to know”), Norwegian Bokmål vide, vite (“to know”), Norwegian Nynorsk veta, vita, våtå (“to know”), Scanian veda (“to know”), Swedish veta (“to know”), Gothic 𐍅𐌹𐍄𐌰𐌽 (witan, “to know”), Italian guidare (“to guide”), Spanish, Portuguese guiar (“to guide”), French guider (“to guide”), and Latin videō (“I see”). Compare guide.

Verb

wit (see below for this verb’s conjugation)

  2. (ambitransitive, obsolete except in to wit) To know, be aware of (constructed with of when used intransitively).
    You committed terrible actions — to wit, murder and theft — and should be punished accordingly.
    They are meddling in matters that men should not wit of.
    • 1483, Thomas Malory, Le morte d'Arthur:
      Truly, said fair Elaine, I shall do all that I may do, for as fain would I know and wit where he is become as you or any of his kin, or queen Guenever, and cause great enough have I thereto as well as any other. And wit ye well, said fair Elaine to Sir Bors, I would lose my life for him rather than he should be hurt.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Exodus 2:3–4:
      And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink. And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him.
    • 1849, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, St. Luke the Painter, lines 5–8:
      but soon having wist
      How sky-breadth and field-silence and this day
      Are symbols also in some deeper way,
      She looked through these to God and was God’s priest.
Usage notes
  • The verb remains in use only in the infinitive form in the fixed expression to wit.
  • As a preterite-present verb, the third-person singular indicative form is not wits but wot; the plural indicative forms conform to the infinitive: we wit, ye wit, they wit.
Conjugation
More information infinitive, present tense ...
Derived terms
Translations

Etymology 3

From with.

Pronunciation

Preposition

wit

  1. (Southern US) Pronunciation spelling of with.

See also

Anagrams

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Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch wit, from Middle Dutch wit, from Old Dutch *wit, from Proto-Germanic *hwittaz.

Pronunciation

Adjective

wit (attributive wit, comparative witter, superlative witste)

  1. white (colour)
    Antonym: swart
  2. white, White (classification of people)
    Synonym: blank
    Coordinate terms: bruin, swart

Inflection

More information predicative, attributive ...

Balinese

Etymology

Borrowed from Old Javanese wwit, wwīt, wit (“origin, cause; base, foundation; stem, tree”).

Pronunciation

Noun

wit (Balinese script ᬯᬶᬢ᭄)

  1. tree
    Wénten wit poh akéh ring Nagara. ― There are many mango trees in Nagara.
  2. origin

Derived terms

Further reading

  • “wit”, in Balinese–Indonesian Dictionary [Kamus Bahasa Bali–Indonesia] (in Balinese), Denpasar, Indonesia: The Linguistic Center of Bali Province [Balai Bahasa Provinsi Bali]
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Belizean Creole

Preposition

wit

  1. alternative form of wid

References

  • Crosbie, Paul, ed. (2007), Kriol-Inglish Dikshineri: English-Kriol Dictionary. Belize City: Belize Kriol Project, p. 374.

Dutch

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Middle Dutch wit, from Old Dutch *wit, from Proto-West Germanic *hwīt, from Proto-Germanic *hwittaz. The geminate is unexpected as the usual Proto-Germanic form is *hwītaz, from Proto-Indo-European *ḱweytos (“shine; bright”).

The geminate is sometimes explained as being the result of Kluge's law, thus from a pre-Germanic *kweyd-nos.

Adjective

wit (comparative witter, superlative witst)

  1. white
    De muur is wit. ― The wall is white.
    Ze droeg een witte jurk tijdens het feest. ― She wore a white dress at the party.
    Zijn tanden zijn witter dan die van haar. ― His teeth are whiter than hers.
  2. (of income) legally obtained by having paid the appropriate taxes
    Zijn inkomen is volledig wit. ― His income is fully legal and taxed.
    Veel mensen streven ernaar om een wit inkomen te hebben. ― Many people aim to have a white, or legally obtained income.
  3. (chiefly Suriname) having a white skin colour, light-skinned (see usage note)
    Synonym: blank
  4. (Suriname) having a relatively light skin colour
  5. (archaic) clear-lighted, not dark at all
    De lang gewenste dag verscheen, heel klaar en wit. ― The long-wished-for day appeared, very clear and white.
Usage notes
  • Since the 2010s, wit has come to be increasingly used in continental Dutch among youth and others (associated with social justice movements) as a more neutral alternative to the most commonly used blank, which is argued to be tainted by the colonial era (see Afrikaans blank) and have a connotation of "cleanliness" and "purity" that wit does not have. See Blank en wit in het racismedebat on nlwiki.
Declension
More information Declension of, uninflected ...
Antonyms
Derived terms

Noun

wit n (plural witten, diminutive witje n)

  1. (uncountable) white (color)
    Wit is alle kleuren ineens.
    White is all colors at once.
  2. (archaic) (short for doelwit (“goal, target, the white in a bullseye”))
    Myn wit is Adam en zyn afkomst te bederven. (in Lucifer, by Vondel)
    My goal is to corrupt Adam and his origin.
  3. (slang) cocaine
    Heb je een halfje wit?
    Do you have a dose of cocaine? (The phrase halfje wit normally means "half a loaf of white bread".)
    • 2011, Esther Schenk, Straatwaarde, Luitingh-Sijthoff B.V., →ISBN:
      Op de Baan verschijnen dealers die gekookte coke aanbieden. Dat is het ei van Columbus. Nu hoef ik niet meer met mijn wit eerst naar huis om het te gaan koken.
      (please add an English translation of this quotation)
    • 2014, Helen Vreeswijk, Overdosis, Unieboek | Het Spectrum, →ISBN:
      ‘Je bestelde ook een halfje wit’, hield De Main hem voor. ‘Wat is dat dan?’
      (please add an English translation of this quotation)
Derived terms
Descendants
  • Afrikaans: wit
  • Berbice Creole Dutch: wete
  • Jersey Dutch: wät
  • Negerhollands: wit, wet
  • → Aukan: weti
  • → Saramaccan: wéti

Verb

wit

  1. inflection of witten:
    1. first/second/third-person singular present indicative
    2. imperative

See also

Colors in Dutch · kleuren (layout · text)
     wit      grijs      zwart
             rood; karmijnrood              oranje; bruin              geel; roomwit
             groengeel/limoengroen              groen             
             blauwgroen/cyaan; groenblauw/petrolblauw              azuurblauw              blauw
             violet; indigo              magenta; paars              roze

Etymology 2

From Middle Dutch wit, from Old Dutch *witti, from Proto-West Germanic *witi, from Proto-Germanic *witją (“knowledge, reason”), from Proto-Indo-European *weyd- (“see, know”).

Related to weten (“to know”), wis (“knowledge”) and wijs (“wise”). Cognate with English wit, German Witz.

Noun

wit n (plural witten, diminutive witje n)

  1. (archaic) ability to think and reason
  2. (archaic) knowledge

Anagrams

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Gothic

Romanization

wit

  1. romanization of 𐍅𐌹𐍄

Javanese

Romanization

wit

  1. romanization of ꦮꦶꦠ꧀

Louisiana Creole

Louisiana Creole cardinal numbers
 <  7 8 9  > 
    Cardinal : wit
    Ordinal : wityèmm

Etymology

Inherited from French huit (“eight”).

Pronunciation

Numeral

wit

  1. eight

Mauritian Creole

Mauritian Creole cardinal numbers
 <  7 8 9  > 
    Cardinal : wit
    Ordinal : witiem

Etymology

From French huit.

Numeral

wit

  1. eight

Middle Dutch

Etymology

From Old Dutch *wit, from Proto-Germanic *hwittaz. The long-vowel variant wijt is from Old Dutch wīt, from Proto-West Germanic *hwīt, from Proto-Germanic *hwītaz.

Adjective

wit

  1. white
  2. clean
  3. pale (of skin)

Inflection

More information singular, plural ...

Alternative forms

Descendants

Further reading

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Middle English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Old English witt, from Proto-West Germanic *witi, from Proto-Germanic *witją.

Alternative forms

Pronunciation

Noun

wit (plural wittes)

  1. mind, sanity
Descendants
References

Etymology 2

From Old English wit (“we two”), from Proto-West Germanic *wit, from Proto-Germanic *wet. Compare the first-person plural pronoun we.

Alternative forms

Pronoun

wit (accusative unk, genitive unker, possessive determiner unker)

  1. (Early Middle English) First-person dual pronoun: we twain, the two of us.
See also
More information nominative, accusative ...
1 Used preconsonantally or before h.
2 Early or dialectal.
3 Dual pronouns are only sporadically found in Early Middle English; after that, they are replaced by plural forms. There are no third person dual forms in Middle English.
4 Sometimes used as a formal 2nd person singular.
References

Nigerian Pidgin

Etymology

From English with.

Preposition

wit

  1. with

North Frisian

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Old Frisian hwīt, from Proto-West Germanic *hwīt, from Proto-Germanic *hwītaz. Cognates include West Frisian wyt.

Pronunciation

Adjective

wit

  1. (Mooring, Sylt) white

Inflection

More information masculine, feminine / neuter ...
More information singular, plural ...

Old Dutch

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *hwīt, from Proto-Germanic *hwītaz.

Adjective

wīt

  1. white

Inflection

Declension of wīt (a-stem)
More information strong declension, case ...

Descendants

References

  • “wīt”, in Oudnederlands Woordenboek, 2012

Old English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *wit, from Proto-Germanic *wet, from a suffixed form of *wéy (see wē). Cognate with North Frisian wat, Old Norse vit, Gothic 𐍅𐌹𐍄 (wit), and Lithuanian vèdu.

Pronunciation

Pronoun

wit

  1. we two
    Wit beǣwnodon ġiestrandæġ.
    We wed yesterday.
    • c. 700 AD, Bēowulf, ll. 1476:
      goldwine gumena, ⁠hwæt wit geō sprǣcon,
      gold-friend of men, how we have already spoken

Declension

More information nominative, accusative ...

Descendants

  • Middle English: wit

Old French

Etymology

Spelling variant of uit

Numeral

wit

  1. eight

Old High German

Etymology

From Proto-Germanic *wīdaz, whence also Old Saxon wīt, Old English wīd and Old Norse víðr.

Adjective

wīt

  1. wide

Descendants

Old Javanese

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *bit

Noun

wit

  1. base
  2. origin
  3. beginning

Verb

wit

  1. to arise
Derived terms

Etymology 2

Probably from Proto-Mon-Khmer *rwiʔ (“fig tree”). (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

wit

  1. tree
  2. stem
  3. base, foundation
  4. origin, cause
Alternative forms
  • wwit
  • wwīt
Derived terms
  • amimiti
  • amwīti
  • awitan
  • kawitan
  • kawwitan
  • makawwitan
  • mawitan
  • mawwit
  • winiwitan
  • winwītan
  • witan
  • wiwitan
  • wwītan
Descendants

Etymology 3

Probably related to Temiar wek (“to go, to leave, to depart”). Compare Indonesian pamit (“to ask for leaving”).

This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.
Particularly: “Collapse all three to one etymology? Cf. Proto-Malayic *puhun, which has an almost identical semantic range ("stem, tree, origin, to beg"), as reflected in Minangkabau puhun (“origin, west/east (cf. Javanese wétan), to beg”), Indonesian mohon (“to beg”), Betawi puun (“tree”) etc. See Adelaar 1992, p. 48.”

Verb

wit

  1. to leave
Alternative forms
  • wwit
Derived terms
  • amit-amitan
  • amwit
  • amwitakĕn
  • amwīt
  • apamit
  • pamwit
  • pinamwitakĕn
  • winwit
  • winwitakĕn

Further reading

  • "wit" in P.J. Zoetmulder with the collaboration of S.O. Robson, Old Javanese-English Dictionary. 's-Gravenhage: M. Nijhoff, 1982.

Old Saxon

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *wit, from Proto-Germanic *wet. Accusative from Proto-Germanic *unk, dative from *unkiz.

Pronoun

wit

  1. we two; nominative dual of ik

Declension

More information nominative, accusative ...

Tagalog

Etymology

From wis, a play on was.

Pronunciation

Pronoun

wit (Baybayin spelling ᜏᜒᜆ᜔) (gay slang)

  1. alternative form of was

Derived terms

  • wititit

Tok Pisin

Etymology

From English wheat.

Noun

wit

  1. wheat

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