wood

WUUD/wʊd/

Pluralwoods (some meanings)

Verbwoods, wooding, wooded

11 meanings of wood

Practice

1
tree materialnoununcountable
The hard material that forms the trunk and branches of trees, used for building, making things, or burning as fuel; a particular kind of it.
The carpenter sanded the wood until it felt smooth.
Much of the world's furniture is made from tropical wood.
UsageSay a piece of wood or some wood for the material. The plural woods means kinds of timber: tropical woods.
Similartimber
Note
Milton pairs it with stone as the stuff idols are carved from.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
Milton pairs wood with stone as materials used to make idols in Paradise Lost. gutenberg.org
2
small forestnouncountable
An area of land covered with growing trees.
We took a shortcut through the wood behind the church.
A deer darted out of the wood and across the road.
UsageOften the woods, plural in form for one place: lost in the woods.
Similarforest, woods, woodland
Note
The singular suits a particular, named tract, like Shakespeare's Great Birnam Wood, which must come to Dunsinane before Macbeth can fall.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
William Shakespeare wrote Macbeth, which names Great Birnam Wood. gutenberg.org
In Macbeth, an apparition prophesies that Macbeth will not be defeated until Great Birnam Wood comes against him at Dunsinane Hill. gutenberg.org
3
cover with treesverbtransitive
To cover an area with trees, or to plant trees on it.
UsageMostly as wooded: a wooded hillside, a wooded area.
Similarforest, afforest, reforest
Oppositedeforest, clear
Note
The verb itself is old: Sir Richard Devereux's letter of 1542 already describes land as "wodey'd," spelled the way the period allowed.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
The verb is attested in a letter attributed to Sir Richard Devereux dated 1542. en.wiktionary.org
The letter describes land using the historical spelling “wodey'd.” en.wiktionary.org

Less common meanings

4
erectionnounslanguncountable
An erection of the penis.
He woke with morning wood and rolled over, annoyed.
Tight jeans did little to hide his sudden wood.
UsageCrude. With no a: someone gets wood or has wood.
Similarerection, boner
5
golf clubnouncountable
A type of golf club with a large rounded head, traditionally made of wood, used to drive the ball over long distances.
She pulled out her three wood for the long fairway shot.
He drove the ball nearly 250 yards with his new wood.
UsageNumbered by club: a three wood, a five wood.
Note
A golfer's name that has outlived its material. The head of the club was traditionally made of wood, and the word stayed after that tradition changed. A club called a wood need not contain any wood at all.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
The club's name comes from its traditionally wooden head. en.wikipedia.org
The name survives despite changes in materials, and a wood can contain no wood. en.wikipedia.org
6
load fuelverbtransitive
To supply something, such as a steamboat, with wood for fuel, or to take on a supply of wood.
Many passengers would save a little by helping to “wood the boat,” i. e., by carrying wood down the bank and throwing it on the boat, a special ticket being issued on that condition.
1891, John Bidwell, “The First Emigrant Train to California”
to wood a steamboat or a locomotive
Note
Steam-age refueling, with the vessel as the object: you wood a steamboat or a locomotive. John Bidwell, writing in 1890 about the first emigrant train to California, describes passengers who paid less by helping to "wood the boat," carrying fuel down the bank themselves. Without an object it means to take on wood, as when a steamer stopped at a landing to wood.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
Wood can transitively mean supplying fuel to a steamboat or locomotive. en.wiktionary.org
John Bidwell's “The First Emigrant Train to California” first appeared in The Century in November 1890. tile.loc.gov
Bidwell describes passengers saving money by helping to “wood the boat,” carrying wood down the bank. tile.loc.gov
Wood also means taking on a supply of wood without an object. en.wiktionary.org
7
take coververbobsoleteintransitivereflexive
To take cover or conceal oneself behind trees.
Note
A military verb of taking cover, which can be used with a reflexive pronoun: troops or quarry wood themselves, retreating among trees out of sight. Its setting is the early colonial account, such as Sir Ralph Lane's report of the Englishmen left in Virginia (first published in 1589). Today the idea would be expressed as taking to the woods.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 3 facts
Wood has a reflexive sense meaning to hide behind trees. en.wiktionary.org
Ralph Lane's account of the Englishmen left in Virginia contains this usage in a military encounter. archive.org
Under the required first-publication convention, use 1589. Circa 1586 is its composition date, not its first-publication year. en.wikipedia.org
8
insaneadjectiveobsolete
Mad, insane, or wildly out of one's senses.
And then he flue on hir as he were wood, / And on hir breeche did hack and foyne a-good.
1593, Thomas Nashe, The Choice of Valentines
And like a lion wood amongst them fares, Dealing his dreadfull blowes with large dispence
1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene
Note
This is a different word wearing the same spelling. It comes from Old English wōd, "mad," and has no connection with timber. It thrives in Elizabethan verse: Spenser's "like a lion wood," Nashe's "as he were wood." It can follow its noun or take a cause, as in E. R. Eddison's "wood with anger" (1922), a deliberate archaism.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 7 facts
The adjective meaning mad has a separate etymology from the timber noun and descends from Old English wōd. en.wiktionary.org
Spenser used the quoted phrase in Elizabethan verse, in The Faerie Queene, Book V, Canto XI; wood follows lion. en.wikisource.org
Nashe used the quoted phrase in The Choise of Valentines, an Elizabethan composition. en.wikisource.org
Wood can follow a noun and take a phrase expressing its cause. en.wiktionary.org
Eddison's narrator uses wood with anger in The Worm Ouroboros. gutenberg.org
The work containing Eddison's quotation was first published in 1922. gutenberg.org
Calling Eddison's usage a deliberate archaism is supported by the novel's sustained imitation of older English. en.wikipedia.org
9
noun
A woodwind instrument, or the woodwind instruments of an ensemble taken together.
10
nounslang
The pieces used in a game of chess, regarded collectively as physical objects.
11
nounslangUS
Chiefly in US prison slang, a white person, especially a white inmate; a clipping of peckerwood, sometimes used as an insult.

Practice

Can you tell the meanings of wood apart? Answer 3 quick questions from this page, or write your own sentence and AI will check it.

Origins

Meanings 1–7

"Wood" comes from Middle English "wode," from Old English "wudu" or "widu" (wood, forest, grove, tree, timber), from Proto-Germanic *widuz, probably from a Proto-Indo-European root *h₁weydʰh₁- meaning "to separate." It is related to Danish, Swedish and Norwegian "ved," Icelandic "viður," and Irish "fiodh" (a wood, tree), but not to Dutch "woud" or German "Wald" (forest).

Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 7 facts

Wood descends through Middle English wode from Old English wudu or widu. en.wiktionary.org
The Old English forms meant wood, forest, grove, tree or timber. en.wiktionary.org
The Old English word descends from Proto-Germanic *widuz. en.wiktionary.org
The proposed further origin is Proto-Indo-European *h₁weydʰh₁-, meaning to separate. en.wiktionary.org
Wood is cognate with Danish, Swedish and Norwegian ved and Icelandic viður. en.wiktionary.org
Irish fiodh is a cognate, glossed as a wood or tree. en.wiktionary.org
Dutch woud and German Wald mean forest and are unrelated to English wood. en.wiktionary.org

Meaning 8

This sense comes from Middle English "wood," from Old English "wōd" meaning "mad, insane."

Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

This sense derives from Middle English wood, from Old English wōd. en.wiktionary.org
Old English wōd meant mad or insane. en.wiktionary.org