whit
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: wĭt
enpr: hwĭt
ipa: /wɪt/
ipa: /ʍɪt/
rhymes: -ɪt
homophone: wit (wine–whine merger)
Forms: form: whits
Etymology: From Middle English wiȝt, wight, from Old English wiht (“wight, person, creature, being, whit, thing, something, anything”), from Proto-Germanic *wihtą (“thing, creature”) or *wihtiz (“essence, object”), from Proto-Indo-European *wekti- (“cause, sake, thing”), from *wekʷ- (“to say, tell”). Cognate with Old High German wiht (“creature, thing”), Dutch wicht, German Wicht. Doublet of wight.
Senses: examples: text: Star. I beleeue we muſt leaue the killing out, when all is done.
Bot. Not a whit: I haue a deuice to make all well.
ref: c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii], page 151:
text: Sadly behind the great age of rowdy self-advertisement in which their lot has fallen, they seem not to have advanced one whit beyond John the Baptist and the Apostles, 1800 years ago, in their notions of the way in which the metanoia, the change of mind of the ill-doer, is to be brought about.
ref: 1890 December 9, Thomas H. Huxley, “Letter to the "Times" on the "Darkest England Scheme"”, in Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays:
text: But now another idea had obtruded itself, and was rapidly crowding his original intentions into the background. That American fortune was not to be sneezed at, nor was its possessor a whit less attractive.
ref: 1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 109:
text: Now I was eight and very small, / And he was no whit bigger / And so I smiled, but he poked out / His tongue, and called me, 'Nigger.'
ref: 1917, Countee Cullen, Incident:
text: In conclusion, I would remark that the great railway stations of London deserve to be visited every whit as much as St. Paul's Cathedral, the Abbey, or the Tower, and they are as worthy a memento of this century as those buildings are of the days that are gone.
ref: 1944 July and August, “London Railway Stations in 1893”, in Railway Magazine, page 201, taken from The English Illustrated Magazine of June 1893:
synonyms: word: bit
word: iota
word: jot
word: scrap
word: ace
word: tinge
word: atom
word: trace element
word: aught
word: bissel
word: bit
word: crumb
word: glimpse
word: dab
word: damn
word: dash
word: diddly
word: glint
word: dot
word: spatter
word: drop
word: dusting
word: fleck
word: hint
word: flip
word: flyspeck
word: grain
word: halfpennyworth
word: inch
word: iota
word: jot
word: lick
word: mite
word: modicum
word: molecule
word: morceau
word: morsel
word: mote
word: ooch
word: ounce
word: particle
word: pennyworth
word: piece
word: pinch
word: scantling
word: semblance
word: scent
word: scintilla
word: scooch
word: scrap
word: scruple
word: shred
word: skerrick
word: skoosh
word: skosh
word: sliver
word: smattering
word: smidge
word: smidgen
word: smidget
word: smidgy
word: smitch
word: smithereen
word: soupçon
word: spark
word: speck
word: speckle
word: spot
word: sprinkle
word: sprinkling
word: strain
word: tad
word: tidbit
word: tidge
word: tittle
word: toddick
word: touch
word: trace
word: trifle
word: tuppence worth
word: vestige
word: whiff
word: whit
glosses: The smallest part or particle imaginable; an iota.
Derived terms: care a whit