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Webster 1913 Edition

Whit

Whit

,
Noun.
[OE.
wight
,
wiht
, AS.
wiht
a creature, a thing. See
Wight
, and cf.
Aught
,
Naught
.]
The smallest part or particle imaginable; a bit; a jot; an iota; – generally used in an adverbial phrase in a negative sentence.
“Samuel told him every whit.”
1 Sam. iii. 18.
“Every whit as great.”
South.
So shall I no
whit
be behind in duty.
Shakespeare
It does not me a
whit
displease.
Cowley.

Webster 1828 Edition

Whit

WHIT

,
Noun.
[L.] A point; a jot; the smallest part or particle imaginable. It is used without a preposition. He is not a whit the wiser for experience.
It does not me a whit displease.
The regular construction would be by a whit, or in a whit. In these phrases, a whit may be interpreted by in the least, in the smallest degree.

Definition 2024

Whit

Whit

See also: whit

English

Noun

Whit ‎(plural Whits)

  1. the season of Whitsuntide

Anagrams

whit

whit

See also: Whit

English

Noun

whit ‎(plural whits)

  1. The smallest part or particle imaginable; an iota.
    He worked tirelessly to collect and wind a ball of string eight feet around, and it matters not one whit.
    • 1602: William Shakespeare, Hamlet, act V scene 2
      Not a whit.
    • 1917, Incident by Countee Cullen
      Now I was eight and very small, \ And he was no whit bigger \ And so I smiled, but he poked out \ His tongue, and called me, 'Nigger.'

Synonyms

  • (smallest part imaginable): bit, iota, jot, scrap
  • See also Wikisaurus:modicum.

Translations

Anagrams

Middle English

Etymology

From Old English hwit.

Adjective

whit

  1. white

Descendants

Scots

Pronoun

whit

  1. what

Etymology

From Middle English, from Old English wiht ‎(“wight, person, creature, being, whit, thing, something, anything”), from Proto-Germanic *wihtą ‎(“thing, creature”) or Proto-Germanic *wihtiz ‎(“essence, object”), from Proto-Indo-European *wekti- ‎(“cause, sake, thing”), from Proto-Indo-European *wekʷ- ‎(“to say, tell”). Cognate with Old High German wiht ‎(“creature, thing”), Dutch wicht, German Wicht. See also wight.

Pronunciation

  • enPR: wĭt, hwĭt, IPA(key): /wɪt/, /ʍɪt/
  • Rhymes: -ɪt
  • Homophone: wit (in accents with the wine-whine merger)

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