dirt

== English == === Alternative forms === durt (obsolete) === Etymology === From Middle English drit (“excrement”), from Old Norse drit (“excrement”), from Proto-Germanic *dritą, *dritō (“excrement”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰreyd-, *treydʰ- (“to have diarrhea”). Cognate with dialectal Danish and Norn drit (“excrement”), Norwegian dritt (“excrement”), dialectal Swedish dret (“shit”), Faroese and Icelandic drit (“bird excrement”), Dutch drijten (“to defecate”), drits (“dirt, mud, filth”), drijt and dreet (“excrement”), Low German drieten (“to defecate”), Driet (“shit”), regional German Driss (“shit”), Old English ġedrītan (“to defecate”). (Can this(+) etymology be sourced?) The word originally referred to excrement before shifting to the current sense of "soil". For a semantic parallel, see Norwegian skitt (“dirt, filth, grime, mud”), from Old Norse skítr (“shit”), which is cognate with English shit. === Pronunciation === (Received Pronunciation) enPR: dût, IPA(key): /dɜːt/ (General American) enPR: dûrt, IPA(key): /dɝt/ (Scotland) IPA(key): /dɪɾt/ (New Zealand, Wales) IPA(key): /døːt/ (Liverpool, fair–fur merger) IPA(key): /deːt/, [deːθ̠] (Humberside, Teesside, fair–fur merger) IPA(key): /dɛːt/ Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)t === Noun === dirt (usually uncountable, plural dirts) (chiefly US) Soil or earth. A stain or spot (on clothes etc); any foreign substance that worsens appearance. Synonym: filth Previously unknown facts or rumors about a person. Synonyms: gossip, kompromat (figurative) Meanness; sordidness. (mining) In placer mining, earth, gravel, etc., before washing. Freckles. (archaic) Excrement; dung. ==== Derived terms ==== ==== Translations ==== === Verb === dirt (third-person singular simple present dirts, present participle dirting, simple past and past participle dirted) (transitive, rare) To make foul or filthy; soil; befoul; dirty === Anagrams === tri-D