English

Adjective

swart ‎(comparative swarter, superlative swartest)

1. Of a dark hue; moderately black; swarthy; tawny.
   • 1400s: Thomas Occleve, Hymns to the Virgin - Men schalle then sone se / Att mydday hytt shalle swarte be
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, Book 2 - A nation strange, with visage swart
   • 1596, William Shakespeare, The Life and Death of King John, III-i - Lame, foolish, crooked, swart, prodigious,
   • 1819, John Keats, Otho the Great, Act II, Scene I, verses 91-92

     I'll choose a gaoler, whose swart monstrous face

     Shall be a **** to look upon […]

   • 1836, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Old Ticonderoga - The merry soldiers footing it with the swart savage maids
2. (Britain dialectal) Black.
3. (obsolete) Gloomy; malignant.
   • 1905, Samuel Major Gardenhire, The Silence of Mrs. Harrold - Page 277:

     The keeping eunuchs were at back, solemn in stately rows, bespeared and bescimitared, the Danish, Irish, and German of their countenances lost in the daub which made them swart.

   • 1906, Lord Dunsany, Time and the Gods - Suddenly the swart figure of Time stood up before the gods, with both hands dripping with blood and a red sword dangling idly from his fingers, and said: “Sardathrion is gone! I have overthrown it!”

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Milton to this entry?)

Derived terms

• swarten
• Swart star, (Rare): the Dog Star -- so called from its appearing during the hot weather of summer, which makes swart the countenance.
• swarthy (< swarty)

Noun

swart ‎(plural swarts)

1. (Britain dialectal) Black or dark dyestuff; something of a certain swart; something of a certain ocker.

Etymology 2

From Middle English swarten, from Old English sweartian ‎(“to become black; make black”), from Proto-Germanic *swartōną ‎(“to blacken, make black”), from Proto-Indo-European *swordos ‎(“black, dirty”).

Verb

swart ‎(third-person singular simple present swarts, present participle swarting, simple past and past participle swarted)

1. (transitive) To make swart or tawny; as, to swart a living part; blacken; tan.
   • 1646, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica - the heate of the Sun, whose fervor may swarte a living part, and even black a dead or dissolving flesh,

Etymology 3

Variant of sward.

Noun

swart ‎(uncountable)

1. Obsolete spelling of sward
   • 1587: Raphael Holinshed, Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland

     Howbeit where the rocks and quarrie grounds are, I take the swart of the earth to be so thin, that no tree of anie greatnesse, other than shrubs and bushes, is able to grow or prosper long therein for want of sufficient moisture wherewith to feed them with fresh humour, or at the leastwise of mould...

References

• swart in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1914

Anagrams

• Straw, straw, warts

Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch zwart.

Adjective

swart ‎(attributive swart, comparative swarter, superlative swartste)

1. black
2. Black

Antonyms

• blank

German Low German

Etymology

From Old Saxon swart, from Proto-Germanic *swartaz, from Proto-Indo-European *swordo- ‎(“dirty, dark, black”).

Adjective

swart ‎(comparative swärter, superlative swärtst)

1. black

Declension

Gothic

Romanization

swart

1. Romanization of 𐍃𐍅𐌰𐍂𐍄

Old Saxon

Etymology

From Proto-Germanic *swartaz, whence also Old English sweart, Old High German swarz, Old Norse svartr. Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *swordo- ‎(“dirty, dark, black”).

Adjective

swart

1. black

Declension

Descendants

• Low German: swart

Scots

Etymology 1

From Middle English swarte, from Old English sweart ‎(“black”), from Proto-Germanic *swartaz ‎(“black”), from Proto-Indo-European *swordo- ‎(“dirty, dark, black”). Cognate with Middle Dutch swart ‎(“black”), Middle Low German swart ‎(“black”).

Noun

swart ‎(plural swarts)

1. Black or dark dyestuff.

Etymology 2

From Old Norse svartr ‎(“black”). Cognate with Norwegian svart ‎(“black”).

Adjective

swart ‎(comparative mair swart, superlative maist swart)

1. Black; swarthy.

Derived terms

• swartback

West Frisian

Etymology

From Old Frisian swart, swert, from Proto-Germanic *swartaz, from Proto-Indo-European *swordo- ‎(“dirty, dark, black”). Compare English and Low German swart, Dutch zwart, German schwarz, Danish sort.

Noun

swart

1. black