dirt

Formsdirts, dirting, dirted

1. 1
   nounUSuncountable

   Loose earth or soil, especially the kind found on the ground.

   Rain turned the bare dirt of the path into thick mud.

   He filled the planter with rich dirt from the garden.

   Similarsoil, earth

   Note

   An Americanism at heart: in the US this is the everyday word for the ground underfoot, where other speakers more often say soil or earth. The meaning has traveled far from its roots. Middle English drit and Old Norse drit both meant "excrement," a sense that survives as the archaic word for dung. It is usually uncountable: some dirt, a pile of dirt, rarely a dirt.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   A stain, spot, or unwanted substance that spoils the appearance of something.

   A smear of dirt ran across the white tablecloth.

   The mechanic wiped the dirt from his hands with an old rag.

   Similarfilth

3. 3
   noununcountable

   Damaging or scandalous information about a person, especially when previously unknown.

   The tabloid promised readers fresh dirt on the celebrity couple.

   His rivals spread dirt about his past to ruin the campaign.

   Similargossip

   Note

   The investigator's and gossip's sense, most at home in the dirt on someone, and in the verb uncover. David Puttnam's Movies and Money (2011) uses it of the Hollywood columnists Louella Parsons and Hedda Hopper, who set out "to uncover dirt and scandal." Gossip may be idle, but dirt is gathered to do harm. Kompromat is the same idea in political dress.

4. 4
   nounfigurativelyuncountable

   Moral baseness or sordidness; behavior that is mean, low, or shameful.

   The memoir exposed the dirt beneath the family's respectable surface.

   He could never wash the dirt of his cowardice from his memory.

   Similarfilth, sleaze, corruption, sordidness, baseness

   Oppositevirtue, decency

   Note

   Moral grime takes the place of the physical kind, a figurative step beyond dirt as a stain. W. Melmoth's 1810 translation of Pliny's Letters laments honors "thrown away upon dirt and infamy." The pairing sets the word beside disgrace rather than untidiness. Used this way, dirt names a quality of character or conduct, not anything a cloth could wipe away.

5. 5
   noununcountable

   Small brownish spots on the skin; freckles.

   Her pale skin showed faint dirt that darkened every July.

   A scattering of dirt had spread over the boy's nose by August.

   Similarfreckles

   Note

   A teasing name for freckles, built on the joke that the spots look like grime that will not wash off. The adjective carries the joke too. Pat Phoenix calls herself "the one with the dirty face," and Kevin O'Hara meets "a dirty-faced redhead" in Ireland. Lindsay Bowman's 2016 essay turns the joke around and urges freckled readers not to hide "that dirt" under foundation.

6. 6
   noununcountable

   In placer mining, the earth, gravel, and similar material dug out before it is washed to recover minerals.

   Prospectors shoveled dirt into the sluice and let the water carry off the lighter material.

   A single pan of dirt from the riverbed held three small nuggets.

   Similargravel

   Note

   A prospector's term, where dirt is raw material rather than waste. In placer mining, earth and gravel are dug from a deposit and washed through pans or sluices. The water carries off the lighter matter and leaves heavier particles such as gold behind. The word marks a stage, not a substance: it is dirt only until it has been washed.

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