different between wet vs sodden

English

Etymology

From Middle English wet (“wet, moistened”), wett, wette, past participle of Middle English weten (“to wet”), from Old English w?tan (“to wet, moisten, water”), from Proto-Germanic *w?tijan? (“to wet, make wet”), from Proto-Indo-European *wed- (“water, wet”) (also the source of water).

Cognate with Scots weit, wete (“to wet”), Saterland Frisian wäitje (“to wet; drench”), Icelandic væta (“to wet”). Compare also Middle English weet (“wet”), from Old English w?t (“wet, moist, rainy”), from Proto-Germanic *w?taz (“wet, moist”), related to Scots weit, weet, wat (“wet”), North Frisian wiat, weet, wäit (“wet”), Saterland Frisian wäit (“wet”), West Frisian wiet (“wet”), Swedish and Norwegian våt (“wet”), Danish våd (“wet”), Faroese vátur (“wet”), Icelandic votur (“wet”).

Pronunciation

• enPR: w?t, IPA^(key): /w?t/
• Rhymes: -?t
• Homophone: whet (in accents with the wine-whine merger)

Adjective

wet (comparative wetter, superlative wettest)

1. Made up of liquid or moisture, usually (but not always) water.

   Synonym: wetting

2. Of an object, etc.: covered or impregnated with liquid, usually (but not always) water.

   Synonyms: damp, saturated, soaked; see also Thesaurus:wet

   Antonym: dry

3. Of a burrito, sandwich, or other food: covered in a sauce.
   • 2000, Robert Allen Palmatier, Food: a dictionary of literal and nonliteral terms, page 372:

     A chimichanga (MWCD: 1982) is a burrito that is deep-fried, rather than baked, and is served in the fashion of a wet burrito.

   • 2005, Restaurant business, Volume 104, Issues 1-10

     The new item is its first "wet," or sauce-topped, burrito.

   • 2011, J. Gabriel Gates, Charlene Keel, Dark Territory, page 13

     But I'm getting the wet burrito.” Ignacio looked down at some sort of a tomato sauce–covered tortilla tube.

4. Of calligraphy and fountain pens: depositing a large amount of ink from the nib or the feed.

5. Of a sound recording: having had audio effects applied.
6. Of weather or a time period: rainy.

   Synonyms: damp, raining, rainy

   Antonyms: dry, sunny

   • 1637, John Milton, Comus, London: Humphrey Robinson, p. 32,^[1]

     Summer drouth, or singed aire

     Never scorch thy tresses faire,

     Nor wet Octobers torrent flood

     Thy molten crystall fill with mudde,
7. (aviation) Using afterburners or water injection for increased engine thrust.

8. (slang) Of a person: inexperienced in a profession or task; having the characteristics of a rookie.

   Synonyms: green, wet behind the ears

9. (slang, vulgar) (of women) Sexually aroused and thus having the vulva moistened with vaginal secretions.

   Synonyms: horny, moist; see also Thesaurus:randy

10. (Britain, slang) Ineffectual, feeble, showing no strength of character.
    • 1924, Percy Marks, The Plastic Age, ch. XVII:

      "Wet! What currency that bit of slang has—and what awful power. It took me a long time to find out what the word meant, but after long research I think that I know. A man is wet if he isn't a 'regular guy'; he is wet if he isn't 'smooth'; he is wet if he has intellectual interests and lets the mob discover them; and, strangely enough, he is wet by the same token if he is utterly stupid. He is wet if he doesn't show at least a tendency to dissipate, but he isn't wet if he dissipates to excess. A man will be branded as wet for any of these reasons, and once he is so branded, he might as well leave college … "

    • 2020, Boris Johnson quoted in "Proms row: Johnson calls for end to 'cringing embarrassment' over UK history," by Jim Waterson, The Guardian, Aug. 25, 2020:

      “I think it’s time we stopped our cringing embarrassment about our history, about our traditions, and about our culture, and we stopped this general fight of self-recrimination and wetness."

    Synonyms: feeble, hopeless, useless, drip

11. (retronym) Permitting alcoholic beverages.
12. (slang, archaic) Refreshed with liquor; drunk.

    Synonyms: inebriated, soused; see also Thesaurus:drunk

    • c. 1694, Matthew Prior, “Celia to Damon”

      […] When my lost Lover the tall Ship ascends, / With Musick gay, and wet with Iovial Friends […]

13. (biology, chemistry) Of a scientist or laboratory: working with biological or chemical matter.

    Antonym: dry

14. (chemistry) Employing, or done by means of, water or some other liquid.

15. (slang, euphemistic) Involving assassination or "wet work".

    a wet affair; a wet job; wet stuff

Derived terms

Descendants

• Bislama: wet
  • ? Araki: wet

Translations

See also

• moist

Noun

wet (countable and uncountable, plural wets)

1. Liquid or moisture.
2. Rainy weather.

   Don't go out in the wet.

3. (Australia) Rainy season. (often capitalized)
   • 1938, Xavier Herbert, Capricornia, New York: D. Appleton-Century, 1943, Chapter XI, page 186-7, [2]

     They'll be in the camp […] before the Wet's out, mark my words.

   • 2006, Alexis Wright, Carpentaria, Giramondo 2012, p. 365:

     He said he wanted to beat the clouds gathering, before the Wet had properly settled itself over the plains again.

   • 2015, David Andrew, The Complete Guide to Finding the Mammals of Australia, Csiro Publishing, Appendix B, page 380 [3]

     Northern Australia is tropical and subject to a prolonged wet season (often called simply 'the Wet') that may last from December to April […] . The Wet features high humidity, heavy rain, flooding that can cut off towns and roads for days on end, and, in most years, violent cyclones that cause high seas, widespread damage and sometimes loss of life.

4. (Britain, UK politics, derogatory) A moderate Conservative; especially, one who opposed the hard-line policies of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.

   Antonym: dry

5. (colloquial) An alcoholic drink.
   • 1974, GB Edwards, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, New York 2007, page 60:

     ‘A pity,’ said Jim, ‘I thought we was going to have a free wet.’

6. (US, colloquial) One who supports the consumption of alcohol and thus opposes Prohibition.
   • c. 1952-1996, Noah S. Sweat, quoted in 1996

     The drys were as unhappy with the second part of the speech as the wets were with the first half.

7. (motor racing, in the plural) A tyre for use in wet weather.
   • 2004, Jonathan Noble, Mark Hughes, Formula One Racing For Dummies (page 303)

     Wets, designed to channel water away from underneath the tyres, maximise grip and minimise the chance of aquaplaning.

8. (colloquial, derogatory) A weak or sentimental person; a wimp or softie.
   • 1984, British Book News (page 324)

     Above all, he [Nigel Molesworth] is his own man, resolutely committed to a view of life that divides his fellow pupils into 'sissies', 'wets', 'swots' and 'old lags'.

Translations

Verb

wet (third-person singular simple present wets, present participle wetting, simple past and past participle wet or wetted)

1. (transitive) To cover or impregnate with liquid.
2. (transitive) To accidentally urinate in or on.

   Johnny wets the bed several times a week.

3. (intransitive) To make or become wet.
4. (transitive, soldering) To form an intermetallic bond between a solder and a metal substrate.
5. (transitive, informal) To celebrate by drinking alcohol.
   • 1826, Thomas Bayly Howell, Thomas Jones Howell, A Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings

     [He] invited some officers and other gentlemen to dine with him at the Dolphin tavern in Tower street, June 17, 1706, in order to wet his commission […]

   to wet the baby's head

6. Misspelling of whet.
7. (US, MLE, slang) To kill or seriously injure.

   Wet 'em up!

Derived terms

Translations

Anagrams

• Tew, ewt, tew

Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch wet,

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /v?t/

Noun

wet (plural wette)

1. law

Derived terms

• klankwet
• wetboek
• grondwet

Araki

Etymology

Borrowed from Bislama wet (“wet”), from English wet.

Adjective

wet

1. (Southwest Santo) wet

References

• François, A. (2002) Araki: A disappearing language of Vanuat, Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. Cited in: "Araki (Southwest Santo)" in Greenhill, S.J., Blust, R., & Gray, R.D. (2008). The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database: From Bioinformatics to Lexomics. Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 4:271-283.

Dutch

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??t/
• Hyphenation: wet
• Rhymes: -?t

Etymology 1

From Middle Dutch wet, wette, wit, weet, from Old Dutch witat, witut (“rule, law”), from Proto-Germanic *wit?þ? (“law”).

Noun

wet f (plural wetten, diminutive wetje n)

1. law (rule)
2. law (body of rules declared and/or enforced by a government)
3. (physics) law

Derived terms

Descendants

• Afrikaans: wet
• ? Indonesian: wet
• ? Madurese: ???? (wet)
• ? Sranan Tongo: wèt

See also

• rechten

Etymology 2

Verb

wet

1. first-, second- and third-person singular present indicative of wetten
2. imperative of wetten

Indonesian

Etymology

From Dutch wet.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?w?t]
• Hyphenation: wèt

Noun

wet or wèt

1. law (rule)

   Synonyms: hukum, undang-undang

Further reading

• “wet” in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia (KBBI) Daring, Jakarta: Badan Pengembangan dan Pembinaan Bahasa, Kementerian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan Republik Indonesia, 2016.

Middle English

Alternative forms

• wett, wette, wete, weet, weete

Etymology

From Old English w?t, w?t, and weten (“to wet”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /w?t/, /w??t/

Adjective

wet

1. wet, watery
2. (weather) wet, rainy
3. liquid, fluid
4. damp, moist, waterlogged
5. (terrain) marshy, boggy
6. (alchemy, medicine) Something that is considered alchemically wet
7. teary, weepy
8. bloody, bloodstained
9. sweaty, having sweat

Descendants

• English: wet
  • Bislama: wet
    • ? Araki: wet
• Scots: wat

References

• “w??t, adj.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-03-26.

Noun

wet (plural wetes or weten)

1. Water or another liquid
2. wetness; wateriness
3. (alchemy, medicine) Alchemical wetness
4. Rain, raininess

Descendants

• English: wet
• Scots: wat

References

• “w??t, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-03-26.

Polish

Noun

wet

1. genitive plural of weto

Tok Pisin

Etymology 1

From English wet.

Adjective

wet

1. wet

Etymology 2

From English wait.

Verb

wet

1. wait

English

Etymology

From Middle English sodden, soden, from Old English soden, ?esoden, from Proto-Germanic *sudanaz, past participle of Proto-Germanic *seuþan? (“to seethe; boil”). Cognate with West Frisian sean, Dutch gezoden, German Low German saden, söddt,German gesotten, Swedish sjuden, Icelandic soðinn. More at seethe.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?s?.d?n/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?s?.d?n/

Adjective

sodden (comparative more sodden, superlative most sodden)

1. Soaked or drenched with liquid; soggy, saturated.
   • 1810, James Millar (editor), Encyclopaedia Britannica, Volume XII, 4th Edition, page 702,

     It is found, indeed, that meat, roa?ted by a fire of peat or turf, is more ?odden than when coal is employed for that purpo?e.

   • 1895 February, James Rodway, Nature's Triumph, The Popular Science Monthly, page 460,

     The outfalls are choked, the dams are perforated by crabs or broken down by floods, and soon the ground becomes more and more sodden.

   • 2014, Paul Salopek, Blessed. Cursed. Claimed., National Geographic (December 2014)[1]

     A miraculous desert rain. We slog, dripping, into As Safi, Jordan. We drive the sodden mules through wet streets. To the town’s only landmark. To the “Museum at the Lowest Place on Earth.”
2. (archaic) Boiled.
   • c. 1569, Hugh Gough (translator), The Ofspring of the House of Ottomanno and Officers Pertaining to the Greate Turkes Court by Bartolomej Georgijevi?, London, Thomas Marshe, “The diuersities of their drinke,”^[2]

     The thirde [drynke] is of that kinde of hony named Pechmes, whiche is made of newe wine sodden, vntill the third parte be boyled awaye […]

   • 1596, Richard Johnson, The Most Famous History of the Seaven Champions of Christendome, London: Cuthbert Burbie, Chapter 14, p. 131,^[3]

     […] howe Almidor the blacke King of Moroco was sodden to death in a cauldrone of boyling leade and brimstone.
3. (figuratively) Drunk; stupid as a result of drunkenness.
   • 1595, George Peele, The Old Wives’ Tale, The Malone Society Reprints, 1908, line 560,^[4]

     You whoreson sodden headed sheepes-face […]

   • c. 1601, William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, Act II, Scene 1,^[5]

     […] thou sodden-witted lord! thou hast no

     more brain than I have in mine elbows […]

   • 1857, Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit, 1899, Reprint Edition, page 60,

     With this profession of faith, the doctor, who was an old jail-bird, and was more sodden than usual, and had the additional and unusual stimulus of money in his pocket, returned to his associate and chum in hoarseness, puffiness, redfacedness, all-fours, tobacco, dirt, and brandy.

   • 2010, Peter Hitchens, The Cameron Delusion, page 79,

     I would have done too, but alcohol makes me so ill that I couldn't (I mention this to make it clear that I don't claim any moral superiority over my more sodden colleagues).

4. (figuratively) Dull, expressionless (of a person’s appearance)
   • 1613, Francis Beaumont, The Knight of the Burning Pestle, London: Walter Burre, Act 5, Scene 1,^[6]

     Remoue and march, soft and faire Gentlemen, soft and faire: double your files, as you were, faces about. Now you with the sodden face, keepe in there […]

   • 1795, Samuel Jackson Pratt, Gleanings through Wales, Holland and Westphalia, London: T.N. Longman and L.B. Seeley, Letter 49, pp. 444-445,^[7]

     Of the music-girls, many are pretty featured, but carry in every lineament, the signs of their lamentable vocation: sodden complexions, feebly glossed over by artificial daubings of the worst colour […]

Synonyms

• (soaked): dopping, waterlogged; see also Thesaurus:wet
• (boiled):
• (drunk): See Thesaurus:drunk
• (dull expression): blank, stonefaced

Derived terms

• soddenly
• soddenness
• tea-sodden football hooligan

Translations

Verb

sodden (third-person singular simple present soddens, present participle soddening, simple past and past participle soddened)

1. (transitive) To drench, soak or saturate.
   • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet Chapter 4

     But as I lay asleep the top had been pressed off the box, and the tinder got loose in my pocket; and though I picked the tinder out easily enough, and got it in the box again, yet the salt damps of the place had soddened it in the night, and spark by spark fell idle from the flint.

2. (intransitive) To become soaked.

Translations

Anagrams

• Seddon