shaw

• shawe (13th–17th centuries)

From Old English sċeaga, scaga. Cognate with Old Norse skógr (“forest, wood”), whence Danish skov (“forest”). Doublet of scaw.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ʃɔː/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ʃɔ/
• (cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /ʃɑ/

• Audio (US):

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• Rhymes: -ɔː
• Homophones: Shaw; sure, shore (Received Pronunciation, pour–poor merger); shah (US, cot–caught merger, father-bother merger), zzxjoanw

shaw (plural shaws)

1. (dated, dialectal) A thicket; a small wood or grove.
   • 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter XII, in Le Morte Darthur, book IX:

     All this herd sire Lamorak / and on the morne sir lamorak took his hors and rode vnto the forest / and there he mette with two knyghtes houynge vnder the wood shawe

     All this heard Sir Lamorak, and on the morn Sir Lamorak took his horse and rode unto the forest, and there he met with two knights hoving under the wood-shaw

   • 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter XXXIX, in Le Morte Darthur, book IX:

     Thenne said sire kay I requyre you lete vs preue this aduenture / I shal not fayle you said sir Gaherys / and soo they rode that tyme tyl a lake / that was that tyme called the peryllous lake / And there they abode vnder the shawe of the wood

     Then said Sir Kay: I require you let us prove this adventure. I shall not fail you, said Sir Gaheris. And so they rode that time to a lake that was that time called the Perilous Lake, and there they abode under the shaw of the wood

   • 1936, Alfred Edward Housman, More Poems, V, lines 1-2:

     The snows are fled away, leaves on the shaws, / And grasses in the mead renew their birth,

2. (Scotland) The leaves and tops of vegetables, especially potatoes and turnips.

   Coordinate terms: straw, stover, trash

   • 1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 35:

     Up here the hills were brave with the beauty and the heat of it, but the hayfield was still all a crackling dryness and in the potato park beyond the biggings the shaws drooped red and rusty already.

• -wash, Haws, WASH, Wahs, Wash, Wash., haws, shwa, wahs, wash

From Middle English schewen, schawen, scheawen, from Old English scēawian, from Proto-Germanic *skawwōną, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewh₁-.

shaw (plural shaws)

1. A show.

shaw (third-person singular simple present shaws, present participle shawin, simple past shawt, past participle shawt)

1. To show.