Wite
noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 Blame, responsibility, guilt. archaic, obsolete, transitive
"Nor I will not suffer mine indignation so to witwanton with fair justice as persuade me to put the wite on Witchland."
- 2 Punishment, penalty, fine, bote, mulct. archaic, obsolete, transitive
- 1 To regard (someone) as guilty, to accuse, to blame, to fault. Scotland, archaic, obsolete, transitive
"[H]e gan fovvly vvyte / His vvicked fortune, that had turnd aſlope, / And curſed night, that reſt from him ſo goodly ſcope."
- 2 To go, go away, depart, perish, vanish archaic, obsolete, poetic, transitive
- 3 To censure (someone); to mulct, to reproach. archaic, obsolete, transitive
"[U]niuſtly thou doeſt vvyte them all, / For that vvhich thou miſlikedſt in a fevv."
- 4 To guard (something); to keep, to observe, preserve, protect. archaic, obsolete, transitive
Antonyms
All antonymsExample
More examples"[H]e gan fovvly vvyte / His vvicked fortune, that had turnd aſlope, / And curſed night, that reſt from him ſo goodly ſcope."
Etymology
From Middle English wīten (“to accuse, reproach, punish, suspect”), Old English wītan (“to look, behold, see, guard, keep, impute or ascribe to, accuse, reproach, blame”), from Proto-West Germanic *wītan, from Proto-Germanic *wītaną. Connected to Old English wīte, see below.
From Middle English wite (“guilt, blameworthiness, blame, wrongdoing, misdeed, offense, punishment, retribution, fine, bote, customary rent”), from Old English wīte (“punishment, pain, torment”), from Proto-West Germanic *wītī, from Proto-Germanic *wītiją, from Proto-Indo-European *weyd- (“to see, find, behold”).
From Middle English witen, from Old English wītan (“to see, accuse, go, depart”), from Proto-West Germanic *wītan, from Proto-Germanic *wītaną, from Proto-Indo-European *weyd- (“to see, find, behold”).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.