In the 16th century, Turkish women could divorce their husbands if the man failed to keep his family’s pot filled with coffee.
WELSH
Welsh, Cambrian
(adjective) of or relating to or characteristic of Wales or its people or their language; “the Welsh coast”; “Welsh syntax”
Welsh, Welsh Black
(noun) a breed of dual-purpose cattle developed in Wales
Welsh, Cymric
(noun) a Celtic language of Wales
Welshman, Welsh, Cambrian, Cymry
(noun) a native or resident of Wales
welsh, welch
(verb) cheat by avoiding payment of a gambling debt
Source: WordNet® 3.1
Etymology
Adjective
Welsh (not comparable)
(now historical) (Native) British; pertaining to the Celtic peoples who inhabited much of Britain before the Roman occupation. [from 5thc.]
(near obsolete) Foreign; non-native. [10th-16thc.]
Of or pertaining to Wales. [from 11thc.]
Of or pertaining to the Celtic language of Wales. [from 16thc.]
Designating plants or animals from or associated with Wales. (See Derived terms.) [from 17thc.]
Noun
Welsh (countable and uncountable, plural Welsh)
(uncountable) The Welsh language. [from 10th c.]
(collectively, plural) The people of Wales. [from 11th c.]
A breed of pig, kept mainly for bacon.
Synonyms
• (language): Cymric, Kymric
Proper noun
Welsh (plural Welshes)
A English and Scottish surname for someone who was a Welshman or a Celt.
An Irish surname, a variant of Walsh.
A town in Louisiana, United States named for early landowner Henry Welsh.
An unincorporated community in Ohio, United States named for an early settler.
Etymology
Verb
welsh (third-person singular simple present welshes, present participle welshing, simple past and past participle welshed)
(offensive) To swindle someone by not paying a debt, especially a gambling debt.
Usage notes
• The use of this term is sometimes considered offensive, especially by Welsh people, because it is taken as a negative stereotype of the Welsh.
Source: Wiktionary
Welsh, a. Etym: [AS. wælisc, welisc, from wealh a stranger, foreigner, not of Saxon origin, a Welshman, a Celt, Gael; akin to OHG. walh, whence G. wälsch or welsch, Celtic, Welsh, Italian, French, Foreign, strange, OHG. walhisc; from the name of a Celtic tribe. See Walnut.]
Definition: Of or pertaining to Wales, or its inhabitants. [Sometimes written also Welch.] Welsh flannel, a fine kind of flannel made from the fleece of the flocks of the Welsh mountains, and largely manufactured by hand.
– Welsh glaive, or Welsh hook, a weapon of war used in former times by the Welsh, commonly regarded as a kind of poleax. Fairholt. Craig.
– Welsh mortgage (O. Eng. Law), a species of mortgage, being a conveyance of an estate, redeemable at any time on payment of the principal, with an understanding that the profits in the mean time shall be received by the mortgagee without account, in satisfaction of interest. Burrill.
– Welsh mutton, a choice and delicate kind of mutton obtained from a breed of small sheep in Wales.
– Welsh onion (Bot.), a kind of onion (Allium fistulosum) having hollow inflated stalks and leaves, but scarcely any bulb, a native of Siberia. It is said to have been introduced from Germany, and is supposed to have derived its name from the German term wälsch foreign.
– Welsh parsley, hemp, or halters made from hemp. [Obs. & Jocular] J. Fletcher.
– Welsh rabbit. See under Rabbit.
Welsh, n.
1. The language of Wales, or of the Welsh people.
2. pl.
Definition: The natives or inhabitants of Wales.
Note: The Welsh call themselves Cymry, in the plural, and a Welshman Cymro, and their country Cymru, of which the adjective is Cymreig, and the name of their language Cymraeg. They are a branch of the Celtic family, and a relic of the earliest known population of England, driven into the mountains of Wales by the Anglo-Saxon invaders.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition
Recent Word Finds
Word of the Day
24 December 2024
INTUITIVELY
(adverb) in an intuitive manner; “inventors seem to have chosen intuitively a combination of explosive and aggressive sounds as warning signals to be used on automobiles”
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