English

Alternative forms

• wyte

Verb

wite ‎(third-person singular simple present wites, present participle witing, simple past and past participle wited)

1. (chiefly Scotland) To blame; regard as guilty, fault, accuse
   • Late 14th century, Geoffrey Chaucer, ‘The Wife of Bath's Tale’, Canterbury Tales:

     As help me God, I shal þee nevere smyte! / Þat I have doon, it is þyself to wyte.

     ‘The Miller's Prologue’, Canterbury Tales:

     And therfore if that I mysspeke or seye, Wyte it the ale of Southwerk, I you preye.

2. To reproach, censure, mulct
3. To observe, keep, guard, preserve, protect

Etymology 2

From Middle English wītan ‎(“guilt, blameworthiness, blame, wrongdoing, misdeed, offense, punishment, retribution, fine, bote, customary rent”), from Old English wīte, see below.

Noun

wite ‎(plural wites)

1. (obsolete outside Scotland) Blame, responsibility, guilt.
   • 1903, A. W. Pollard (ed.), Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory (1485) , volume I, Bk. I, chapter XXVII:

     And so by fortune the ship drave unto a castle, and was all to-riven, and destroyed the most part […]. So many lords and barons of this realm were displeased, for their children were so lost, and many put the wite on Merlin more than on Arthur; so what for dread and for love, they held their peace.

     • 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter xxiij, in Le Morte Darthur, book I:

     And so by fortune the shyp drofe vnto a castel and was al to ryuen and destroyed the most part […]/ So many lordes and barons of this reame were displeasyd / for her children were so lost / and many put the wyte on Merlyn more than on Arthur / so what for drede and for loue they helde their pees

   • 1922, E. R. Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros, The Project Gutenberg, Australia:

     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.

Etymology 3

From Old English witan

Verb

wite ‎(third-person singular simple present wites, present participle witing, simple past and past participle wited)

1. (obsolete or poetic) To go, go away, depart, perish, vanish

References

• Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

Old English

Etymology

Cognate with Old Frisian wīte, Old Saxon wīti, Dutch wijte, Old High German wīzi, Old Norse víti.

Pronunciation

Noun

wīte n ‎(nominative plural wītu)

1. punishment, torment, torture

   Hé wíte wealdeþ. — He is the disposer of punishment. (He wields punishment.)

2. plague, disease, evil, injury, pain

   Of ðam wíte gehǽled; — Healed of the disease.

3. penalty, fine, bote: contribution, in money or food, to sustenance of king or his officers
4. woe, misery, distress

Declension

Derived terms

Scots

Verb

wite

1. Alternative form of wyte

West Frisian

Verb

wite

1. Alternative form of witte

Inflection