From Middle English wode, from Old English wudu, widu ("wood, forest, grove; tree; timber"), from Proto-West Germanic *widu, from Proto-Germanic *widuz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weydʰh₁-.

Cognate with Dutch wede, Middle High German wite, Danish ved, Swedish ved, Icelandic viður. Further cognates include Irish fiodh, Irish fid and Welsh gwŷdd; all from Proto-Celtic *widus.

• (RP, Australia, America) enPR: wo͝od, IPA: /wʊd/

wood

1. (uncountable) The substance making up the central part of the trunk and branches of a tree. Used as a material for construction, to manufacture various items, etc. or as fuel.

   This table is made of wood.

   There was lots of wood on the beach.

   • 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC ↗; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC ↗, lines 1006–11:

     O that men / (Canſt thou believe ?) ſhould be ſo ſtupid grown, / While yet the Patriark liv’d, who ſcap’d the Flood, / As to forſake the living God, and fall / To worſhip thir own work in Wood and Stone / For Gods !

   • 1963, Margery Allingham, “Foreword”, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC ↗:

     He stood transfixed before the unaccustomed view of London at night time, a vast panorama which reminded him […] of some wood engravings far off and magical, in a printshop in his childhood.

2. (countable) The wood of a particular species of tree.

   Teak is much used for outdoor benches, but a number of other woods are also suitable, such as ipé, redwood, etc.

3. (countable, often, as plurale tantum) A forested or wooded area.

   Synonyms: woods, forest, woodland, Thesaurus:forest

   A wood beyond this moor was viewed as a border area in the seventeenth century.

   He got lost in the woods beyond Seattle.

   • c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act IV, scene i], page 144 ↗, column 2, lines 92–94:

     Macbeth ſhall neuer vanquiſh’d be, vntill / Great Byrnam Wood, to high Dunſmane Hill / Shall come againſt him.

4. Firewood.

   We need more wood for the fire.

   • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VIII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC ↗:

     We toted in the wood and got the fire going nice and comfortable. Lord James still set in one of the chairs and Applegate had cabbaged the other and was hugging the stove.

5. (countable, golf) A type of golf club, the head of which was traditionally made of wood.
6. (music) A woodwind instrument.
7. (uncountable, slang) An erection of the penis.

   That girl at the strip club gave me wood.

8. (chess, uncountable, slang) Chess pieces.
   • 1971, Chess Life & Review, volume 26, page 309:

     […] White has nothing but a lot of frozen wood on the board while Black operates on the Q-side.

• (substance) timber
• (wooded area, US) wood lot

• wooden

• French: bois
• German: Holz
• Italian: legno
• Portuguese: madeira
• Russian: де́рево
• Spanish: madera

• French: bois
• German: Holz, Holzart
• Italian: legname
• Portuguese: madeira
• Russian: де́рево
• Spanish: madera

• French: bois
• German: Waldland, Waldung
• Italian: bosco
• Portuguese: bosque
• Russian: лес
• Spanish: bosque

• French: bois de chauffage
• German: Feuerholz, Brennholz
• Italian: legna
• Portuguese: lenha
• Russian: дрова́
• Spanish: leña

• German: Holz

• Italian: legni

• German: Latte
• Portuguese: tusa, tesão
• Russian: стоя́к

wood (woods, present participle wooding; simple past and past participle wooded)

1. (transitive) To cover or plant with trees.
   • 1542, Sir Richard Devereux, letter, in Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, London: J. Nichols, published 1792, page 155 ↗:

     Their be ii good bellys, a chales, and a few veſtments of litil valure, the ſtuff beſide is not worth xl s. lead ther ys non except in ii gutters the which the p’or hath convey’d in to ye town, but that is ſuar yt is metely wodey’d in hege rowys.

2. (reflexive, intransitive) To hide behind trees.
   • c. 1586, Sir Ralph Lane, “Lane’s Account of the Englishmen Left in Virginia”, in Henry Sweetser Burrage, editor, Early English and French Voyages: Chiefly from Hakluyt, 1534–1608, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, published 1906, page 246 ↗:

     Immediatly, the other boate lying ready with their shot to skoure the place for our hand weapons to lande upon, which was presently done, although the land was very high and steepe, the Savages forthwith quitted the shoare, and betooke themselves to flight: wee landed, and having faire and easily followed for a smal time after them, who had wooded themselves we know not where […]

3. (transitive) To supply with wood, or get supplies of wood for.

   to wood a steamboat or a locomotive

4. (intransitive) To take or get a supply of wood.

• German: aufforsten
• Italian: rimboschire
• Portuguese: florestar
• Spanish: forestar

From Middle English wood, from Old English wōd.

wood (comparative wooder, superlative woodest)

1. (obsolete) Mad, insane, crazed.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC ↗:

     And like a lion wood amongst them fares,
     Dealing his dreadfull blowes with large dispence

   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act IV, scene vii], page 114 ↗, column 1:

     How the young whelpe of Talbots raging wood, / Did fleſh his punie-ſword in Frenchmens blood.

wood (plural woods)

1. (US, sometimes offensive, chiefly, prison slang, of a person) A peckerwood.
   • 1991, Mary E. Pelz, James W. Marquart and Terry Pelz, "[https://web.archive.org/web/20101213143956/http://brokenchains.us/documents/abt1.pdf Right-Wing Extremism in the Texas Prisons: The Rise and Fall of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas]", The Prison Journal, Winter-Fall 1991:

     He further stated that "I can't remember ever seeing a wood [white inmate] assault a nigger without being provoked".

   • 2009, Brendan Joel Kelly, “[https://web.archive.org/web/20100720171716/http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2009-05-14/calendar/pride-vs-power/ Pride vs. Power]”, in The Phoenix New Times:

     Other than shout-outs to fellow "woods," I found no references on their record to racism, and after getting to know the members, I think Woodpile's message is the opposite of what the L.A. Times construed it to be — they want to bring hardcore white guys to rap music, rather than alienating anyone of any race.

• IPA: /wʊd/

1. An English topographic surname for someone who lived in or near a wood.
2. Surname for a woodsman.
3. A number of places in USA:
   1. A twp in Clark County, Indiana.
   2. An unincorporated community in Clayton County, Iowa.
   3. An unincorporated community in DeKalb County, Missouri.
   4. An inactive township in Wright County, Missouri.
   5. An unincorporated community in Franklin County, North Carolina.
   6. An unincorporated community in Bedford County, Fulton County.
   7. A twp in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania.
   8. A small town in Mellette County, South Dakota.
   9. An unincorporated community in Mason County, West Virginia.
   10. A town in Wood County, Wisconsin.