swarth
English
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /swɔː(ɹ)ð/ or IPA(key): /swɔː(ɹ)θ/
Noun
swarth (countable and uncountable, plural swarthes or swarths)
- Alternative form of sward
- Herman Melville
- Last year's scythes flung down, and left in the half-cut swarths.
- Cowper
- Grassy swarth, close cropped by nibbling sheep.
- Herman Melville
Etymology 2
See swart.
Adjective
swarth (comparative more swarth, superlative most swarth)
- (archaic) swarthy
- 1855, Robert Browning, “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”, XII:
- […] What made those holes and rents / In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to baulk / All hope of greenness? […]
- Chapman
- a swarth complexion
- 1855, Robert Browning, “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”, XII:
Noun
swarth
- An apparition of a person about to die; a wraith.
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Grose to this entry?)
Middle English
Etymology 1
From Old English sweard.
Etymology 2
From Old English swaþu; influenced by the above noun.
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