different between hant vs haint

English

Etymology 1

See haunt.

Noun

hant (plural hants)

1. (US, colloquial, chiefly African-American Vernacular) A ghost; a supernatural being.
   • 1907, Harold Bell Wright, New York: A.L. Burt, The Shepherd of the Hills, Chapter I, p. 20,^[1]

     “ […] Say, Mister, did you ever see a hant?”

     The gentleman did not understand.

     “A hant, a ghost, some calls ’em,” explained Jed.

   • 1934, Cecile Hulse Matschat, Suwannee River: Strange Green Land, New York: The Literary Guild of America, Chapter Three, p. 52,^[2]

     […] he shivered as though a hant had touched him with its ghostly fingers, for night was near and he was alone in a depth of the swamp where he had never been before.

   • 1967, Richard M. Dorson, American Negro Folktales, Greenwich, Connecticut: Fawcett, “Spirits and Hants,” p. 213,^[3]

     The term “hant” covers all malevolent and inexplicable sights and sounds. Primarily hants protect buried treasure and linger about ghoulish death spots.

   • 1969, Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, New York: Bantam, 1971, Chapter 22, p. 140,^[4]

     Naturally, I believed in hants and ghosts and “thangs.” Having been raised by a super-religious Southern Negro grandmother, it would have been abnormal had I not been superstitious.

Etymology 2

Contraction

hant

1. Pronunciation spelling of hadn’t.

Anagrams

• -anth, Hnat, Nath, Than, tahn, than

Cimbrian

Etymology

From Middle High German hant, from Old High German hant. Cognate with German Hand, English hand.

Noun

hant f (plural hénte, diminutive héntle)

1. (Sette Comuni) hand

Declension

Derived terms

• drukhan de hénte
• hàntafa ?

References

• “hant” in Martalar, Umberto Martello; Bellotto, Alfonso (1974) Dizionario della lingua Cimbra dei Sette Communi vicentini, 1st edition, Roana, Italy: Instituto di Cultura Cimbra A. Dal Pozzo

Hungarian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?h?nt]

Noun

hant (plural hantok)

1. clod (lump of earth)
2. grave (place of burial)

Declension

Derived terms

• hantol

Middle Dutch

Etymology

From Old Dutch hant

Noun

hant f

1. hand
2. person
3. side

Inflection

This noun needs an inflection-table template.

Descendants

• Dutch: hand
• Limburgish: handj
• Zealandic: and

Further reading

• “hant”, in Vroegmiddelnederlands Woordenboek, 2000
• Verwijs, E.; Verdam, J. (1885–1929) , “hant”, in Middelnederlandsch Woordenboek, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, ?ISBN

Old Dutch

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *handu.

Noun

hant f

1. hand

Inflection

Alternative forms

• ande (in compounds)

Descendants

• Middle Dutch: hant
  • Dutch: hand
  • Limburgish: handj
  • Zealandic: and

Further reading

• “hant”, in Oudnederlands Woordenboek, 2012

Old High German

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *handu, whence also Old English hand, Old Norse h?nd, Gothic ???????????????????????? (handus).

Noun

hant f

1. hand

Declension

Descendants

• Middle High German: hant
  • Bavarian: Hond

    Cimbrian: hant

    Mòcheno: hònt

  • German: Hand
  • Hunsrik: Hand
  • Luxembourgish: Hand
  • Vilamovian: haond
  • Yiddish: ?????? (hant)

References

1. Köbler, Gerhard, Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, (6. Auflage) 2014

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /he?nt/
• Rhymes: -e?nt

Etymology 1

Verb

haint (third-person singular simple present haints, present participle hainting, simple past and past participle hainted)

1. (US, dialectal) Alternative form of haunt
   • 1988, Randy Russell, Janet Barnett, Dead Dan's Shadow on the Wall, in Mountain Ghost Stories and Curious Tales of Western North Carolina, page 5,

     Looking from juror to juror and seeking out the smug faces of the witnesses who'd testified against him, he repeated his threat. "Those who say I kilt anybody are liars," he proclaimed. "And each of you will be hainted every day for the rest of your life. Then the devil will have ye."

   • 2003, Winson Hudson, Derrick Bell, Constance Curry, Mississippi Harmony: Memoirs of a Freedom Fighter, page 17,

     After he killed him, Ed came back and he didn't have no head and he hainted [haunted] Ole Master until he died himself — getting in his way all the time — Ole Ed would be right there with him.

Noun

haint (plural haints)

1. (US, dialectal) Ghost.
   • 1960, Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, J. B. Lippincott Co., p. 254.

     "Ain't you scared of haints?"

   • 1987, Toni Morrison, Beloved, page 18:

     I got a tree on my back and a haint in my house, and nothing in between but the daughter I am holding in my arms.

   • 2005, "The Four-Legged Haint" by Eulie Rowan, in The Seven Wonders of Sassafras Springs, Simon and Schuster, p. 106:

     It didn't take long for word to spread that there was a "haint" in the graveyard. A haint is what the old-timers called a ghost.

Etymology 2

Contraction

haint

1. (dialectal) Alternative form of ain't

Anagrams

• IHNTA, Ihnat, Intha, ahint

Cimbrian

Etymology

From Middle High German *heinaht, from Old High German h?naht (“tonight”), from h? (“this”, from Proto-Germanic *hiz) + naht (“night”). Cognate with obsolete German heint, heinacht (“tonight”), Bavarian heint (“today”).

Adverb

hàint

1. (Sette Comuni) this evening

Derived terms

• hàintenacht (“tonight”)

References

• “haint” in Martalar, Umberto Martello; Bellotto, Alfonso (1974) Dizionario della lingua Cimbra dei Sette Communi vicentini, 1st edition, Roana, Italy: Instituto di Cultura Cimbra A. Dal Pozzo

Irish

Noun

haint f sg

1. h-prothesized form of aint

Welsh

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /hai?nt/

Noun

haint f (plural heintiau, not mutable)

1. infection, disease

   Synonym: clefyd

2. plague, pestilence

   Synonyms: pla, bad

Derived terms

• heintio
• heintrydd
• heintus

Further reading

• R. J. Thomas, G. A. Bevan, P. J. Donovan, A. Hawke et al., editors (1950–present) , “haint”, in Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru Online (in Welsh), University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies