Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A wood or grove; a copse.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A dialectal variant of hold.
  • noun A hole; a burrow; specifically, a deep hole in a river for the protection of fish.
  • noun A contracted form of holdeth, third person singular present indicative of hold.
  • noun A wood or woodland; a grove; an orchard.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • obsolete 3d pers. sing. pres. of hold, contr. from holdeth.
  • noun A piece of woodland; especially, a woody hill.
  • noun A deep hole in a river where there is protection for fish; also, a cover, a hole, or hiding place.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A small piece of woodland or a woody hill; a copse.
  • noun The lair of an animal, especially of an otter.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English holt, from Old English holt ("forest, wood, grove, thicket; wood, timber"), from Proto-Germanic *hultan (“wood”), from Proto-Indo-European *kald-, *klād- (“timber, log”), from Proto-Indo-European *kola-, *klā- (“to beat, hew, break, destroy, kill”). Cognate with Scots holt ("a wood, copse. thicket"), North Frisian holt ("wook, timber"), West Frisian hout ("timber, wood"), Dutch hout ("wood, timber"), German Holz ("wood"), Icelandic holt ("woodland, hillock"), Old Irish caill ("forest, wood, woodland"), Ancient Greek κλάδος (kládos, "branch, shoot, twig"), Albanian shul ("door latch").

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Examples

  • Chaucer -- for he knew that "smalè foulès" shelter in the "hethe" as well as in the "holt" -- among broom and bracken, and heath and rushes.

    Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 Various

  • Everybody on the border in those days used to steal, and their best "holt," as we say, was cattle.

    Public Speaking Irvah Lester Winter

  • Riley's best "holt" as a poet was his memory of his own boyhood and his perception that the child-mind lingers in every adult reader.

    The American Spirit in Literature : a chronicle of great interpreters Bliss Perry 1907

  • At length, in spite of his antagonist's agility, the bear managed to get his "holt," and puss, wrapped in his strong arms, was practically whipped; not without protest -- she was a "last-ditch" warrior.

    Red Saunders' Pets and Other Critters Henry Wallace Phillips 1899

  • Livy laid her japonica, down to get a better "holt" for kissing -- which Susie presently perceived, and became thoughtful: then said sorrowfully, turning the great deeps of her eyes upon her mother: "Don't you care for you wow?"

    Complete Letters of Mark Twain Mark Twain 1872

  • Livy laid her japonica, down to get a better "holt" for kissing -- which Susie presently perceived, and became thoughtful: then said sorrowfully, turning the great deeps of her eyes upon her mother: "Don't you care for you wow?"

    Mark Twain's Letters — Volume 2 (1867-1875) Mark Twain 1872

  • A woodpecker called loudly in the beech wood; a "wish-wish" in the air overhead was caused by the swift motion of a wood-pigeon passing from "holt" to "hurst," from copse to copse.

    The Life of the Fields Richard Jefferies 1867

  • It is well known that if you seize a deer by this "holt" the skin will slip off like the peel from

    The Complete Project Gutenberg Writings of Charles Dudley Warner Charles Dudley Warner 1864

  • It is well known that if you seize a deer by this "holt" the skin will slip off like the peel from a banana -- This reprehensible practice was carried so far that the traveler is now hourly pained by the sight of peeled-tail deer mournfully sneaking about the wood.

    In the Wilderness Charles Dudley Warner 1864

  • 25D: Burrow: rabbit:: holt: _____ (otter) - I know "holt" only from the opening of "Canterbury Tales," but I don't remember OTTERs being involved.

    Rex Parker Does the NYT Crossword Puzzle 2009

Comments

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  • One of the witch's familiars:

    "came in like a white kittling"

    April 23, 2008

  • –noun Archaic.

    1. a wood or grove.

    2. a wooded hill.

    July 12, 2009