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WITTOL (n. pl. -S)
Definition(s):
- (n.) a man who tolerates his wife’s infidelity; a contented cuckold
- (n.) a half-witted person; a fool (rare)
Useful information for game players:
- Front hooks: (none)
- Back hooks: -S
- Anagrams: (none)
- Longer extensions: (none)
- Wraparounds: (none)
- Other Spellings: (none)
- Related Forms: (none)
Epilogue:
Love and marriage, and associated notions of trust and infidelity, were major themes of drama and song of the late Middle Ages (c. 1200-1500), and it was during that era that English picked up the following threesome (ahem) of related words: CUCKOLD, CORNUTO, and WITTOL.
The term CUCKOLD (“the husband of an unfaithful wife”) dates from the 1200s and comes from the name of the cuckoo bird, some varieties of which lay their eggs in the nests of other birds. The word CORNUTO (which also means “the husband of an unfaithful wife”) dates from the 1400s and relates to a different popular association in which unfaithful husbands were said to “wear horns” — perhaps from an association with the horns of a goat, or perhaps because the husband is imagined to wear metaphorical horns of humiliation. Thus, it derives from the Latin cornu (“horn”).
WITTOL, also dating from the 1400s, goes further than the other two terms, meaning “a husband who knowingly tolerates his wife’s infidelity.” There are two theories about its origin: one is that it derives from woodwale or witwall, an archaic name for a bird (probably either a type of oriole or a type of woodpecker) in whose nest the cuckoo sometimes deposited its eggs; the other theory, generally more accepted, is that it is a combination of the old verb wit (“to know”) and the second half of CUCKOLD: that is, literally a “knowing-cuckold,” a wit-old or wittol.
All of these words were once well known and have been employed by Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare, Byron, and many other famous writers through the ages. Today, despite the abundance of talk and reality shows in which they might be put to good use, all three are on the verge of obsolescence.
This week’s theme: Words starting with the letter W
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