whittle

Etymology

It is from Middle English whittel (“a knife”), recorded as a noun from 1404 and used as a verb from 1552.^[2][3][4] The Middle English noun is a variant of thwitel (“a large knife”),^[2][5][6][3] probably formed from thwiten (“to cut, whittle”),^[7][5][8][3] which is Old English þwītan (“to cut, cut off”).^[9][6][4] The OED compares the change of the first consonant with whack and whang.^[2] The Old English verb goes back to Proto-Germanic *þwītaną,^[1][3][10] and is cognate with Old Norse þveita (“to hew, hurl”);^[3][5][4] the Middle English Dictionary and Bosworth–Toller compare Old Norse words for a small axe.^[7][9] Etymonline and Wiktionary trace it further to Proto-Indo-European *twey- (“to shake, agitate, toss”),^[4][1] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged compares Lithuanian tvyskinti (“to strike sharply”).^[5] Klein relates it to þveitr (“a piece of land”), literally land cut off, the source of thwaite.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

A knife, especially a large one: 1404, in the records of the borough of Nottingham.^[2] The older form thwitel is recorded as the name of a knife from 1322,^[7] and Chaucer's miller in the Reeve's Tale carries "a Sheffeld thwitel" in his hose;^[12][7] a manuscript of about 1410 reads whitel in the same line.^[7]

Semantic evolution

The verb, first recorded in Huloet's dictionary of 1552, meant to cut thin shavings from a stick or the like, and to pare or sharpen it in this way.^[3][2][6] Johnson (1755) defined it as to cut with a knife, to edge or sharpen, and marked it as no longer in use,^[13] but the figurative sense, to reduce something by taking away a little at a time, is recorded from 1746, in a letter of Horace Walpole,^[2][4] and is now the commonest use, especially in whittle down and whittle away.^[12][14][5] The sense "to make or shape by whittling" appears in 1848, in a letter of J. R. Lowell.^[2] The noun meanwhile became a dialect word:^[15][6] the English Dialect Dictionary found it in general use in Scotland, Ireland, England and America, and notes that a Lancashire man called a knife, especially a clasp-knife, a whittle.^[16] In northern English dialect the verb also came to mean to worry or fret, from 1880.^[2][14]

Timeline

• 1404 – noun, a knife, especially a large one such as a carving knife or butcher's knife.^[2][5]
• 1552 – verb, to cut thin shavings from the surface of a stick or the like; to pare or sharpen with a knife.^[2][3][5]
• 1614 – intransitive, to whittle.^[2]
• 1736 – to wear away by a process like paring.^[2]
• 1746 – figurative, to reduce or diminish by degrees.^[2][4]
• 1848 – to make or shape by whittling; to carve.^[2]
• 1880 – in dialect, to worry or fret.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To cut thin shavings or chips from a piece of wood with a knife: He sat on the porch whittling a branch.^[14][5][2]
2. To make or shape something by cutting away shavings; to carve: She whittled a toy boat from a block of pine.^[14][5][2]
3. To reduce or wear away gradually, as if by paring, usually with down or away: Rising costs whittled away their savings.^[14][5][2]
4. (dialect) In northern England, to worry or fret.^[14][2]

Noun

1. (dialect) A knife, especially a large one, such as a butcher's knife or a clasp knife.^{[14][5][2][15]}

Word family

• whittler
• whittling

Related words

• thwaite

Usage notes

Several other words of this spelling are recorded.^[2][5] One is Old English hwītel, formed from white and the suffix -le and corresponding to Old Norse hvítill (“a white bed cover”): a blanket or cloak, later a shawl, or a baby's flannel petticoat.^[2][5][15] Johnson (1755) gave it as "a white dress for a woman", no longer in use,^[13] and the English Dialect Dictionary found it in Ireland and in English counties including Leicestershire, Devon and Cornwall.^[16] In Scotland, Ireland and Yorkshire, whittle is also a shortening of whitlow.^[2][5][16] An obsolete verb whittle, to make drunk, recorded from 1530 to 1652, is usually taken as a figurative use of the cutting verb, though the OED finds the evidence wanting,^[2] and in 18th-century slang whittle was a variant of whiddle, to inform on one's accomplices, first in Swift.^[2][17]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c d Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c d e Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
10. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
11. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
13. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c d e f g Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
15. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
16. ^ a b c Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
17. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com