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geld

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

See also: Geld and geldt

English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Middle English geld and reinforced by Medieval Latin geldum, both from Old English geld, ġield (“payment, tribute”), from Proto-West Germanic *geld, from Proto-Germanic *geldą (“reward, gift, money”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰeldʰ- (“to pay”). Probably reinforced by gelt (which see), see Norwegian Bokmål gjeld (“debt”), Danish gæld (“debt”). Geld is also written gelt or gild, and as such found in wergild, Danegeld, etc.

Cognates

Cognate with North Frisian jild (“money”), Saterland Frisian Jield, Jäild (“money”), Dutch geld (“money”), German Geld (“money”), Old Norse gjald (“payment”), Gothic 𐌲𐌹𐌻𐌳 (gild, “tribute”). Also related to English yield.

Noun

geld (countable and uncountable, plural gelds)

  1. (chiefly archaic, dialectal or historical) Money.
    1. (Northern England) A payment.
    2. (historical) In particular, (money paid as) a medieval form of land tax.

Verb

geld (third-person singular simple present gelds, present participle gelding, simple past and past participle gelded)

  1. (historical) To tax geld.
Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English gelden, from Old Norse gelda (“to geld, castrate”), from Proto-Germanic *galdijaną (“to castrate”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰel- (“to cut”).[1][2]

Cognate with Old Norse geldr (“yielding no milk, dry”), German galt, gelt (“not giving milk, barren”), Gothic 𐌲𐌹𐌻𐌸𐌰 (gilþa, “sickle”).[3] Compare the archaic German Gelze (“castrated swine”) and gelzen (“to castrate”), Danish galt (“castrated boar”) (from Old Norse gǫltr (“boar, hog”), cognate with English gilt and gilde (“to geld”). "gelding" derives from Old Norse geldingr.[2]

Verb

geld (third-person singular simple present gelds, present participle gelding, simple past and past participle gelded or gelt)

  1. (transitive) To castrate a male (usually an animal).
    • 1922, Virginia Woolf, Jacob's Room, Vintage Classics, paperback edition, pages 16–17:
      "Poor old Topaz," said Mrs Flanders, as he stretched himself out in the sun, and she smiled, thinking how she had had him gelded, and how she did not like red hair in men.
  2. (transitive, figurative) To deprive of anything essential; to weaken.
Translations

Noun

geld (plural gelds)

  1. A female animal, such as a ewe or cow, that is not pregnant.

References

  1. [1]
    Pokorny, Julius (1959) “434”, in Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch [Indo-European Etymological Dictionary] (in German), volume 2, Bern, München: Francke Verlag, page 434
  2. [2]
    Douglas Harper (2001–2025) “geld”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
  3. [3]
    “geld”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Anagrams

Afrikaans

Dutch

Icelandic

Old English

Scots

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