swete

From French souhaiter (“wish”).

• IPA^(key): /swete/

swete

1. to wish

From Old English swēte, swōt.

• suete, sweete, swote, swoote, swoot, sote, soot

• IPA^(key): /ˈsweːt(ə)/, /ˈswoːt(ə)/, /ˈsoːt(ə)/

swete

1. sweet, pleasant-tasting
2. sweet in smell
   • a. 1400, Geoffrey Chaucer, “The Knight's Tale”, in The Canterbury Tales, lines 3690–3691:

     But first he cheweth greyn and lycorys / To smellen sweete, er he hadde kembd his heer.

     Though first he chews spices and licorice, / To smell sweet before he'd combed his hair.

3. pleasant, likeable
4. loved, dear, precious

• hony-swete

• English: sweet
• Scots: sweet, sweit, swet
• Yola: sweet

• “swẹ̄t(e, adj.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 9 March 2018.

swete (plural swetes)

1. sweetness in taste or smell
2. pleasantness, euphoria, bliss

• “swẹ̄te, n.(2).”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 9 March 2018.

From Old English swāt, from Proto-Germanic *swait-. The vocalism was sometimes influenced by swǣtan.

• swette, swhete, squete, swæt, swate, swote, swot

• IPA^(key): /ˈswɛːt/, /ˈswɔːt/
• (Northern) IPA^(key): /ˈswɑːt/

swete (plural swetes)

1. blood
2. sweat, perspiration

• English: sweat; swot
  • → Esperanto: ŝvito
• Scots: sweet, swate, swait, swete, sweit

swete

1. alternative form of suet

• swœ̄te, swoete

From Proto-West Germanic *swōtī, from Proto-Germanic *swōtuz, from Proto-Indo-European *sweh₂dus.

• IPA^(key): /ˈsweː.te/

swēte (comparative swētra, superlative swētest)

1. sweet (of smell or taste)
   • Exeter Book, riddle 40

     Iċ eom on gōman ġēna swētra
     þonne þū bēobrēad blende mid huniġe;

     I am sweeter still in the mouth
     than when you blend bee-bread with honey

2. pure, untainted (of a taste)
3. harmonious
4. agreeable, pleasant, sweet (of personality)

• swētan
• swētlīċe
• swētnes
• swōte
• unswēte

• Middle English: swete, soote; swoote, sweete
  • Scots: swet, sweit, sweet
  • English: sweet

• Joseph Bosworth; T. Northcote Toller (1898), “swéte”, in An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, second edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press.