Added 9 October 2026
sweat
/swɛt/ noun
In Latin: sūdor Wiktionary
noun Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about sweat at Wordnik → Where our words come from →
- Fluid that exits the body through pores in the skin usually due to physical stress and/or high temperature for the purpose of regulating body temperature and removing certain compounds from the circulation.
-
The state of one who is sweating; diaphoresis.
Just thinking about the interview tomorrow puts me into a nervous sweat.
- Hard work; toil.
verb
- To emit sweat.
-
To cause to excrete moisture through skin. To cause to perspire.
His physicians attempted to sweat him by most powerful sudorifics.
-
To cause to perspire.
His physicians attempted to sweat him by most powerful sudorifics.
Origin
From Middle English swete, swet, swate, swote, from Old English swāt, from Proto-Germanic *swait-, *swaitą, from Proto-Indo-European *swoyd- (“to sweat”), o-grade of *sweyd- (“to sweat”). Cognate with West Frisian swit, Dutch zweet, German Schweiß, Danish sved, Norwegian Bokmål svette, Norwegian Nynorsk sveitte, Swedish svett, Yiddish שוויצן (shvitsn) (English shvitz), Latin sudor, French sueur, Italian sudore, Spanish sudor, Portuguese suor, Persian خوی (xway, “sweat”), Sanskrit स्वेद (svéda), Lithuanian sviedri, Tocharian B syā-, Albanian djersë, and Welsh chwys.
From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)