# The origin of the Dutch word "woud"



## Lars H

Hej

I have - a bit surprisingly - found out that there are different Germanic words meaning "wood" or "forest" that are similar to each other but still not related (that is, if my sources are correct).

English "wood", German "Wald" and Swedish "ved" do all mean "forest".
"Wood" and "ved" is also something that you put in your fireplace (But not "Wald").
So now I wonder about the Dutch "woud". Where does the word originate from, and is it related to either the German, English or Nordic words, or perhaps to two or three?
Any information would be most helpful.

Best regards

Lars H


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## Frank06

Lars H said:


> So now I wonder about the Dutch "woud". Where does the word originate from, and is it related to either the German, English or Nordic words, or perhaps to two or three?


Dutch "woud" is a cognate of the Wald and wood. Old Dutch had "wald", Middle Dutch forms were "wout", "wolt", "walt". 
Old Dutch isn't that terribly well preserved in the texts, but even quite some Middle Dutch texts still have forms with -al(D) and -ol(D). One can roughly say that (Modern) Dutch has -ou(D), where German and English have (or had) -ol(D) and -al(D). In which (D) stands for a dental stop.
In an equally rough way one can say that the sound change started in Early Middle Dutch and reached its conclusion in Late Middle, Early Modern Dutch.

Similar developments can be found back in the series
- Dutch hout; Old Dutch holt; Old Saxon, Old English, Old Norse holt; Old High German holz;
(that's what we put in the fireplace 
- Dutch oud; Old Saxon ald; Old High German alt; Old English eald; Modern English old;
- and many many more.

From the top of my head, there is one Dutch word in which this sound change was undone: at the end of the 18th century, "outer" (outaar) was used, but the contemporary form is "altaar" (alter). 

I guess something similar is found in older French, where Latin -al(d) resulted in -au(D), as in falta > faut. But I haven't looked closely into this and maybe it's stuff for a new thread. 

Groetjes,

Frank


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## Lars H

Frank06 said:


> Dutch "woud" is a cognate of the Wald and wood.



Perhaps my sources are correct, but I have misunderstood them.

Swedish etymologists sees a kinship between "ved" and "dividere". A forest named "ved" is not only huge, it signifies the border between lands - divides one land from another (Tiveden, Holaveden, Hanveden are still today dense woods, difficult to pass through besides the paths).

Then we have "Wald" and "woud" (Scandinavian "vall"). As Frank points pout, it ought to be related to "wood". "Wald" is the outside, the other, in my tongue "utmark"

On the other hand, also a wall, as known from "Woldstraat", "Vallgatan", "Wall street" or "Wallstrasse" signifies something that divides the town/settlement from the outside.

So, is is possible to link "wall" to "wood" or are we speaking of different origins?

I will have to get back to my sources and see if I can find any link between "vall" and "ved" in any Scandinavian language.

Best regards


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## Frank06

Lars H said:


> Perhaps my sources are correct, but I have misunderstood them.


Oops, I stand corrected!
The etymology of "woud" isn't the problem, my assertion that it is a cognate of English "wood" seems to be completely wrong. 

Dutch "woud", German "Wald" go back to PGmc. *walþu-, Old Norse vǫllr, Old English weald.
While English "wood" (OE wudu, widu), Old High German witu, Old Norse viðr goes back to PGmc. *widuz.

So, the first sentence of my first reply should read as 


			
				frank06 said:
			
		

> Dutch "woud" is a cognate of Wald and wood.


My apologies for the confusion!

Frank


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## Lars H

Frank06 said:


> My apologies for the confusion!



No problem, I was confused already when I started this thread 

"Wood"-"Woud"-"Wald"-"Ved" seemed all so neat together, with "woud" as the logical link between English and German so I think you can see why I was puzzled to see that there were two possible roots involved.

I guess the fact that "wood" and "ved" also are to be found in the fireplace, but not "woud" or "Wald", gives us a clue. furthermore "woud" has a sibling in English. Add the lost "l" and you get "wold" as perhaps in the toponomy "Cotswolds".

And then we have "holt", or "hult" in Swedish. The word is a bit archaic today, except for use in placenames, but the meaning is more "grove, small wooded area" and certainly nothing that would fit into the fireplace.

Best regards

Lars


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## Joannes

Lars H said:


> And then we have "holt", or "hult" in Swedish. The word is a bit archaic today, except for use in placenames, but the meaning is more "grove, small wooded area" and certainly nothing that would fit into the fireplace.


And is that yet another root from what we put in the fireplace and what you guys use to make furniture? Because we have it (*hout*) at the end of a lot of placenames as well.

As a sidenote: to my impression the Dutch (who tend to make clogs out of the stuff) don't have as many toponyms ending in *-hout* as we have, though.


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## CapnPrep

Lars H said:


> furthermore "woud" has a sibling in English. Add the lost "l" and you get "wold" as perhaps in the toponomy "Cotswolds".


That's right, and there's also _weald_. The funny thing about _wold_ is that people forgot that it was supposed to mean "wood", because the places called that were no longer particularly wooded, and so it came to mean "hill" or even "open plain"!



> And then we have "holt", or "hult" in Swedish. The word is a bit archaic today, except for use in placenames, but the meaning is more "grove, small wooded area" and certainly nothing that would fit into the fireplace.


The OED mentions _holt_ meaning "a rough stony hill or ridge" in Icelandic. Doesn't sound like a good place to find wood…



Joannes said:


> And is that yet another root from what we put in  the fireplace and what you guys use to make furniture?


No, it's the same root, PGmc *_hulto_. (You also find _-holt_ in many English placenames.)


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## Lars H

Joannes said:


> And is that yet another root from what we put in the fireplace and what you guys use to make furniture?



We (not me, other Swedes) make furniture out of "trä", from "träd", (tree).
"Trä" is used in Norwegian and Danish also, but spelled differently


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## sound shift

The East of the Netherlands has place names ending in -wold (or -wolde) and not -woud, while the West of the Netherlands has place names ending in -woud and not -wold (or -wolde). According to http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=wold, "wold" is Middle Dutch, so presumably "wold" underwent a shift to "woud" in the West, but not in the East.


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## Lars H

CapnPrep said:


> The OED mentions _holt_ meaning "a rough stony hill or ridge" in Icelandic. Doesn't sound like a good place to find wood…



It is perhaps not such a bad place after all. OED might be a bit misleading here.

In the Nordic languages, "holt/hult" does mean small forest/grove". For example, in my country there are numerous "-hult" in placenamnes, such as "Ekhult" (oak), "Granhult" (spruce), "Björkhult" (birch tree), "Lönnhult" (maple) and so on. 

Furthermore, I checked on the Scandinavian forum here and got confirmation that "holt" could mean "small forest" in Icelandic.

One could bear in mind that the woods of Iceland have undegone a tremendous change since the ninth century A.D. when the first Norse settlers came. It is believed that up to 25-30% of the island was covered by woods then, to be compared with less than 1% today. This could have effected the view of what an Icelandic "holt" is.
The woods were mainly made out of tiny, low growing birch trees, not high pine/spruce as in Scandinavia. An old joke riddle: "What should you do if you get lost in an Icelandic forest?". And the answer is: "Stand up!"


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## Frank06

Hi,

"Holt" is also found back in the first part of Holland (lit. wood(ed)-land).

Frank


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## CapnPrep

Frank06 said:


> "Holt" is also found back in the first part of Holland (lit. wood(ed)-land).


Now that's what I call a placename! 



Lars H said:


> It is perhaps not such a bad place after all. OED might be a bit misleading here.


I didn't reproduce the entire entry, and I didn't mean to sound like I was contradicting you. Of course the original meaning of ON. _holt_ is "wood, copse". Also, _Holz_ in German used to have this meaning (Grimm: "eine mit waldbäumen und sträuchern dicht bestandene fläche, wald"), as did _hout_ in Dutch (WNT: "De dicht opeenstaande boomen waarmede een stuk grond  van zekere uitgestrektheid begroeid is met dezen grond als eenheid  beschouwd: woud, bosch"). But nowadays Icelandic _holt_ *primarily* means "hill" (see Cleasby/Vigfusson), and _Holz _and _hout_ *primarily* refer to the material wood. And probably in the other languages (English, Swedish, etc.), the word doesn't mean anything at all anymore, to most people.


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## Lars H

CapnPrep said:


> And probably in the other languages (English, Swedish, etc.), the word doesn't mean anything at all anymore, to most people.



Agree. "Hult" is very common as parts of Sw. placenames and family names, but if I used the word in a conversation, few fellow countrymen would understand what I meant.

No contradiction involved as I see it. It is only interesting to see what happends with "wood"-connected words when the woods they are describing actually vanishes.

Icelands religious centre for eight hundred years or so, Skálholt, was written "Scaldholz" in AD 1075 by a German scribe, Adam of Bremen. I have never been there but from the photos I found on the web it doesn't look bewooded at all today.


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## Domhnuil

Lars H said:


> Hej
> 
> I have - a bit surprisingly - found out that there are different Germanic words meaning "wood" or "forest" that are similar to each other but still not related (that is, if my sources are correct).
> 
> English "wood", German "Wald" and Swedish "ved" do all mean "forest".
> "Wood" and "ved" is also something that you put in your fireplace (But not "Wald").
> So now I wonder about the Dutch "woud". Where does the word originate from, and is it related to either the German, English or Nordic words, or perhaps to two or three?
> Any information would be most helpful.
> 
> Best regards
> 
> Lars H



I don't know about the Dutch word, but German Wald is allied to the English word Weald or Wold, as in the Weald in Sussex, or the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire Wolds, all meaning wooded hills.


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## Frank06

sound shift said:


> The East of the Netherlands has place names ending in -wold (or -wolde) and not -woud, while the West of the Netherlands has place names ending in -woud and not -wold (or -wolde). According to http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=wold, "wold" is Middle Dutch, so presumably "wold" underwent a shift to "woud" in the West, but not in the East.


Just as an illustration: a few place names (well, basically the same name) in Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany (from west to east):
Boechoute (Belgium, East Flanders)
Boechout (Belgium, Antwerp)
Bocholt (Belgium, Limburg)
Bocholtz (The Netherlands, Limburg)
Bocholt (Germany, North Rhine-Westphalia)


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## Lars H

Lars H said:


> On the other hand, also a wall, as known from "Woldstraat", "Vallgatan", "Wall street" or "Wallstrasse" signifies something that divides the town/settlement from the outside.



Now I have the dubious pleasure to being forced to correct myself. My own examples above are off topic in this thread. I have just found out that there are not two roots here, but three or four:

From the Latin word "vallum" (meaning defensive structure, palissade, rampart) we got words like English "wall", German "Wand", Danish "val" and Swedish "vall".

From the Proto Germanic word "walthuz" (which might have meant woodland/forest, or meadow/field - or both) comes Dutch "woud", German "Wald, English "weald" or "wold", Danish "vold" or Swedish "vall". (So Sw. "vall" has actually two different meanings)

From Proto Germanic. "widuz" comes English "wood" or Scandinavian "ved". According to Swedish etymologists, this might be related to Latin "dividere", originally meaning "bordering forest, dividing two lands/fifedoms".

And finally, the German "Holz", Dutch "hout", Scandinavian "holt/hult", Old English "holt" and in names like "Holland" (thank you, Frank) or "Holstein". Could come from the Proto Germanic root "khulto", and Greece, "klados".


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## Domhnuil

Already I'm in trouble for going off piste, and that's my first attempt at answering a post. Anyway I'll try to be good from now on.
It takes some time for me to ingest such convoluted explanations, but I find yours rather interesting. It seems to me then that Woud, Wald and Wold etcetera all stem from Indo-European via Roman Vallum? I can imagine that a range of hills, or a line of forest might have been seen as a wall. There are such places in Britain, such as the Devil's Dyke, Hadrian's wall, and Offa's Dyke. The last one between Mercia and Wales. The word Dyke in English being either a wall, or a man made waterway.


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## Lars H

Hej



Domhnuil said:


> It seems to me then that Woud, Wald and Wold etcetera all stem from Indo-European via Roman Vallum?



From what I have learned in this thread, these words do not come from the same source. The Dutch "woud" is in English "weald", "wold" or even "wald" as in Tynwald, Isle of Man. This originally Norse name equals the Icelandic "Þingvellir" where the latter part of the word means "field" (used for the meeting/political assembly), in fact the very opposite to "woods". It's for obvious reasons far more practical to hold a meeting in an open space than among trees. 
In Swedish the word "fäbodvall" is still used, meaning "summer pasture for cattle, grass meadows in higher grounds". Another example, sports grounds and football fields are often named "-vallen". No trees to be found there.

What might be a bit confusing is that in German and Dutch, the use of "Holz" for woods (as in Holland, Holstein) seem to have been replaced with "Wald/woud", originally not really meaning exactly "woods". 




Domhnuil said:


> There are such places in Britain, such as the Devil's Dyke, Hadrian's wall, and Offa's Dyke. The last one between Mercia and Wales. The word Dyke in English being either a wall, or a man made waterway.



"Dyke" in Scandinavian is "dike", meaning English "ditch". I think that any "Dykes" are named after the dug part - the ditch as such - of the earthwork, not the wall made out of the soil dugged out.


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## Domhnuil

First of all Lars the past of Dug is Dug, not Dugged. I think it should be Duggen, or Digged, but then I'm not in control of the language. My wife, who is Scottish, says that in Scotland all dykes are stone walls. In the flat country of my home county of Lincolnshire they are for water drainage. A ditch is usually round a field.

I believe the English word Holt in many placenames means a wood.


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## Lars H

Domhnuil said:


> First of all Lars the past of Dug is Dug



I am not the least surprised I got it wrong  I rewrote it a couple of times, but then I settled for what I wrote, suspecting it was not correct. But thank you for correcting me



Domhnuil said:


> ...in Scotland all dykes are stone walls.


Does that mean that they are stone walls today, or were they originally solely built as stone walls, with no ditch/trench/grave/dig to follow them? I checked with etymonline on "dike" and this web site did not exactly contradict what you wrote about dykes in Scotland, but it seems that it should be some sort of a dig involved as well.



Domhnuil said:


> A ditch is usually round a field.


So is Sw. "dike". Crop fields are after all more common than defensive military earthworks. But since ditch/dike/dyke are so very close - also in meaning - one could expect there is a kinship.



Domhnuil said:


> I believe the English word Holt in many placenames means a wood.


I agree. There is more on this in another thread; http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1899497


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