Whale-road

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The ocean; the open sea. literary

    "[…] and his name was called Scyld. He grew to man's estate, and became a mighty king, and subdued the peoples under him. All the neighboring peoples across the whale roads obeyed Scyld."

Example

More examples

"[…] and his name was called Scyld. He grew to man's estate, and became a mighty king, and subdued the peoples under him. All the neighboring peoples across the whale roads obeyed Scyld."

Etymology

From whale + road, after Old English hranrād, from hran (“whale”) + rād (“road”), though this translation is debated. Another translation is hran as dolphin and rād as a modified form of rāden (to ride). Therefore, hranrād would be the "riding place of dolphins" or "dolphins' riding".

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.