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An alternative spelling of wimble, that is a boring tool, used in many crafts, and common in farming and coal-mining contexts.
dates 1490 1571 1581

won

spellings wone
To live or dwell in a place.
dates 1490 1512 1530

The forms of this word all have to do with customary practice.
places Elmswell
dates 1642

A pile or stack of wood.
places Thirsk
dates 1612 1796

In early records the word ‘collier’ often referred to a charcoal burner.
dates 1567-1568 1577 1628 1675

A payment due to the officers of a forest for wood gathered there.
places Pickering
dates 1334

Probably distinguishing wood pasture from the uncultivated woods.
places Settrington
dates 1599

Evidently a managed wood, presumably one with ‘haggs’.
places Selby Flaxley
dates 1237 1297

On record as an occupational term and by-name in Yorkshire in the fourteenth century. Possibly a wood-cutter since no early examples of that word have been noted.
places York Headingley
dates 1357 1379

A building where wood could be stored.
places Selby
dates 1658

An official whose task it was to oversee the woods on an estate.
places Selby
dates 1519

A short sword or dagger, noted in the OED from the early fifteenth century and said to have been used for cutting up game or as a weapon.
dates 1394 1403 1472 1523 1566

Not always an occupational term. In the earliest examples quoted in the OED it could be a hunter of game and even a madman or lunatic. In the sense of a workman employed to look after a wood it is noted only from 1426.
dates 1307 1324 1390

A dealer in wood, a timber merchant.
dates 1599 1795

A figure from which a mould can be made for a casting.
places Rotherham
dates 1761

A wood-pile.
places Stockeld
dates 1653

Household utensils made of wood.
dates 1556 1558 1629

Perhaps a regional variant of woodward, that is an employee who regularly walked in the woods as a keeper.
places Brandsby
dates 1616 1623

The person who looked after the wood or forest, a term in use from the Old English period.
dates 1275 1333

A satyr or faun, a wild man of the woods.
places Durham Beverley
dates 1381 1498 1520-1530

The figurative use of this term may have obscured the fact that it referred to the collecting of pieces of wool caught on hedgerows and whins or simply lying in the fields.
dates 1595 1632 1688 1734

A word found only in Leeds, where wool, like clothes more generally, was draped over a ‘hedge’ to dry. The evidence is not conclusive but it seems likely that such a ‘hedge’ was made of rails.
places Leeds Rodley
dates 1579-1580 1588 1650 1653 1700

A building for the storage of wool, noted in an early Wakefield by-name.
dates 1275 1316 1379 1465 1527-1528 1672

This unusual term had the same meaning as ‘unbound wheels’, that is wheels without a studded metal tyre.
dates 1497 1524 1542 1559 1572 1578

spellings wool chapman
A dealer in wool, or a wool merchant.
places York Ripon
dates 1377 1390 1428 1441 1475-1476 1561

A large bag into which wool or fleeces were packed for carriage.
places Killinghall York
dates 1377 1427 1445

Occupational for the labourer who earned a living by transporting wool.

Almost certainly a spinning wheel.
dates 1556 1657 1676

In this context, the tasks required by sawyers to work in the woods.
dates 1549

spellings working board
In smithies of various kinds, references have been found to a wooden board or table, linked with other furniture, which provided a work surface away from the anvil or forge.
places York Sheffield
dates 1374 1490 1503 1713

For clothiers this was a room in the upper storey of a cottage where the loom was kept.

The tools required by different workmen.
dates 1492-1493 1544 1574 1709

The implement's precise function is not apparent in such contexts but it may have been a section of a tree trunk over which a hide could be draped when it was being ‘wrought’, similar to the beam used when the hide was converted into a butt or the scudding-beam in more modern tanneries.
places Selby
dates 1658 1660 1686

spellings workmanlike workmanly
By the mid-fifteenth century the word workman had acquired the meaning of ‘skilled craftsman’, and ‘workmanlike’ meant ‘characteristic of a skilful workman’.
dates 1422 1475 1486 1579 1623 1624 1666 1701 1704 1744 1766

As a vocabulary item ‘wormstall’ is defined in the OED as ‘an outdoor shelter for cattle in warm weather’, and the inference is that ‘shelter’ refers to a building, such as a shed.
dates 1200-1220 1514 1540 1543 1592 1665

To kill by strangling or biting the throat.
places Methley
dates 1554

A woollen fabric made from well-twisted yarn spun of long-staple wool, combed to lay the fibres parallel. Examples from 1296 confirm the derivation from the village of Worstead in Norfolk (OED).
dates 1310 1347 1401 1455 1561 1720 1741 1755 1805

The infusion of malt or other grain which produced beer once fermentation had taken place.
dates 1396 1423 1440 1444 1510 1542 1544 1571

An implement used in the drawing of wire.
places Methley
dates 1546

A partition or internal wall.
dates 1575 1594 1609 1627 1630 1634


Perhaps a twisted or crooked stip of land.
dates 1200-1299 1202 1290-1291 1300-1399 1352 1613 1618

spellings wrangwisely
In an incorrect way, wrongly.
dates 1300 1433-1434 1468 1505

A dialect word noted in the Craven Glossary, which means a mark and swelling on the skin, caused by a blow.
places West Riding
dates 1725

A worker of wood, a carpenter or joiner.
dates 1379 1404-1405 1518 1570-1580 1642

Used in building contracts to identify the carpenters’ responsibilities.
dates 1484 1689

A pliant shoot from trees such as the hazel and willow, with a range of possible uses.
dates 1600 1617

An earlier form of ‘worked’, that is worked by hand or worked up. It has survived in terms such as wrought iron.
dates 1486 1500 1584 1662 1705-1708 1713

Possibly compost from the folding of animals.
places Halifax
dates 1533

spellings weind wend (2)
An alley or narrow lane in a built-up area, often at right angles to the main street.
dates 1200-1299 1381 1442-1443 1505 1649 1660

Photo by Kreuzschnabel CC BY-SA 3.0