wold
/wəʊld/ noun, adjective, proper noun
Also a form of weld
Forms wolds wolder woldest
- noun (archaic, regional) An unforested or deforested plain, a grassland, a moor.
- noun (obsolete) A wood or forest, especially a wooded upland.
- adjective (archaic, dialect, West Country, Dorset, Devon) Old.
- proper noun A surname.
Etymology
From Middle English wald, walde, weld, welde, wold, wolde, woolde, wæld, from Old English wald, weald, from Proto-West Germanic *walþu, from Proto-Germanic *walþuz (“forest”), possibly from a Proto-Indo-European *wel- (“to perceive, see”) or *welH- (“to roll, undulate”). Largely displaced by forest.
Compare North Frisian wald, walt (“forest”), Saterland Frisian Woold (“forest”), West Frisian wâld (“forest”), Alemannic German and German Wald (“forest, woods”), Bavarian Woid (“forest, woods”), Cimbrian balt (“forest, woods”), Dutch woud (“forest, woods”), Low German Woold, Woolt (“forest”), Luxembourgish Wal (“forest”), Mòcheno bòlt (“wood, woodland”), Yiddish וואַלד (vald, “forest”), Danish val (“plain”), vold (“field, meadow”), Faroese vøllur (“lawn; field”), Icelandic völlur (“lawn; field”), Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk voll (“meadow”), Swedish vall (“field, pasture”); also Hittite 𒌑𒂊𒂖𒇻𒍑 (ú-e-el-lu-uš, “meadow, pasture”). See also wald, weald, ultimately of the same origin.
Inherited from Middle English wolde.
* As a Norwegian surname, spelling variant of Vold, Voll.
* As an English surname, from wold (“forest”).
Webster’s 1913
- noun A wood; a forest.
- noun A plain, or low hill; a country without wood, whether hilly or not. And from his further bank Ætolia's wolds espied. Byron.
- noun See Weld.
Etymology [OE. wold, wald, AS. weald, wald, a wood, forest; akin to OFries. & OS. wald, D. woud, G. wald, Icel. völlr, a field, and probably to Gr. va a garden, inclosure. Cf. Weald.]
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “wold”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details