wont
Pronunciation
  • (RP) IPA: /wəʊnt/, /wɒnt/
  • (GA) enPR wŏnt, IPA: /wɑnt/, /wɔnt/, /woʊnt/
Noun

wont (uncountable)

  1. (archaic) One's habitual way of doing things; custom, habit, practice#Noun|practice.
    He awoke at the crack of dawn, as was his wont.
    • [1644], John Milton, Of Education. To Master Samuel Hartlib, [London: Printed for Thomas Underhill and/or Thomas Johnson], OCLC 15697904; republished in The Works of John Milton, Historical, Political, and Miscellaneous. Now More Correctly Printed from the Originals, than in any Former Edition, and Many Passages Restored, which have been hitherto Omitted. To which is Prefixed, an Account of His Life and Writings [by Thomas Birch]. In Two Volumes, volume I, London: Printed for A[ndrew] Millar, in the Strand, 1753, OCLC 873117158, page 147 ↗:
      [T]hey [Spartan youth] are by a ſudden alarum or watch-word, to be called out to their military motions, under ſky or covert, according to the ſeaſon, as was the Roman wont; […]
    • 1885, Richard F. Burton, The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 563:
      […] when Sindbad the Seaman had related the history of what befel him in his sixth voyage, and all the company had dispersed, Sindbad the Landsman went home and slept as of wont.
    • 2001, Orhan Pamuk; Erdağ M. Göknar, transl., “I am Called Black”, in My Name Is Red, London: Faber and Faber, ISBN 978-0-571-20047-4; paperback edition, London: Faber and Faber, 2002, ISBN 978-0-571-21224-8, page 62 ↗:
      With a simple-minded desire, and to rid my mind of this irrepressible urge, I retired to a corner of the room, as was my wont, but after a while I realized I couldn't jack off—proof well enough that I'd fallen in love again after twelve years!
Translations Adjective

wont (not comparable)

  1. (dated) Accustomed or used (to or with a thing), accustomed or apt (to do something).
    He is wont to complain loudly about his job.
    • circa 1580 Edmund Spenser, “The Teares of the Mvses[: Thalia]”, in Complaints: Containing Sundrie Small Poemes of the Worlds Vanitie. VVhereof the Next Page Maketh Mention, London: Imprinted for VVilliam Ponsonbie, dwelling in Paules Churchyard at the signe of the Bishops head, published 1591, OCLC 837506270; republished in “The Teares of the Mvses ↗[: Thalia]”, in The Faerie Qveen: The Shepheards Calendar: Together with the Other Works of England's Arch-Pöet, Edm. Spenser: Collected into One Volume, and Carefully Corrected, London: Printed by H[umphrey] L[ownes] for Mathew Lownes, 1617, OCLC 165949289:
      What be the ſweet delights of learning a treaſure, / That wont with Comick ſock to beautify / The painted Theaters, and fill with pleaſure / The liſtners eyes, and eares with melodie; […]
Translations Verb

wont (wonts, present participle wonting; past and past participle wonted)

  1. (transitive, archaic) To make (someone) used to; to accustom.
  2. (intransitive, archaic) To be accustomed (to something), to be in the habit#Noun|habit (of doing something).
    • 1751, [Thomas Gray], An Elegy Wrote in a Country Church-yard, London: Printed for R[obert] Dodsley in Pall-Mall; and sold by M[ary] Cooper in Pater-noster-Row, OCLC 927152780; republished as “An Elegy Written in a Country Church Yard”, in A Collection of Poems in Six Volumes. By Several Hands, volume IV, 2nd edition, London: Printed by J. Hughs, for R[obert] and J[ames] Dodsley, at Tully's-Head in Pall-Mall, 1758, OCLC 938458905, page 5 ↗:
      On ſome fond breaſt the parting ſoul relies, / Some pious drops the cloſing eye requires; / Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, / Ev'n in our Aſhes live their wonted Fires.
Translations Translations


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