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mouldwarp. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
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English
Etymology
From Middle English moldewarpe, moldewarp, moldewerp, (also molwarpe, molewarpe), from Old English *moldeweorpe, ("mole"; literally "earth-thrower"; compare Old English wandeweorpe (“mole”)), from Proto-Germanic *muldawurpiz (“earth-thrower, mole”), equivalent to mould + warp.
Cognate with Scots malwart, modewarp (“mole”), Dutch molworp (“mole”), Low German mulworp, molworm (“mole”), German Maulwurf (“mole”), Danish muldvarp (“mole”), Swedish mullvad (“mole”), Icelandic moldvarpa (“mole”).
Pronunciation
Noun
mouldwarp (plural mouldwarps)
- (now regional, archaic) A mole, Talpa europea.
1595, Ed. Spencer [i.e., Edmund Spenser], Colin Clouts Come Home Againe, London: T C for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, signature D3, verso:For either they be puffed vp vvith pride, / Or fraught vvith enuie that their galls do ſvvell, / Or they their dayes to ydleneſſe diuide, / Or drovvnded lie in pleaſures vvaſtefull vvell, / In vvhich like Moldvvarps nouſling ſtill they lurke, / Vnmyndfull of chiefe parts of manlineſſe, / And do themſelues for vvant of other vvorke, / Vaine votaries of laeſie loue profeſſe, […]
1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: , 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II, section 3, member 1, subsection i:as the moldiwarp in Æsop told the fox […], you complain of toys, but I am blind, be quiet […].
1913, D H Lawrence, Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. , →OCLC:"Yi, an' there's some chaps as does go round like moudiwarps." He thrust his face forward in the blind, snout-like way of a mole, seeming to sniff and peer for direction.
Translations