unwashed

English

Etymology

From Middle English unwasched, unwasschyd, unwessched, a weak verb conjugation of earlier Middle English unwaschen (“unwashen”), equivalent to un- +‎ washed.

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɒʃt

Adjective

unwashed (not comparable)

1. Not having been washed.

   Synonym: (obsolete) unwashen

   • 1820, [Walter Scott], chapter IV, in The Abbot. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne & Co.] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and for Archibald Constable and Company, and John Ballantyne, […], →OCLC, page 85:

     I say that the eyass should have her meat unwashed, until she becomes a brancher—’twere the ready way to give her the frounce, to wash her meat sooner, and so knows every one who knows a gled from a falcon.

2. Vulgar, plebeian, lowbrow. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

Derived terms

• great unwashed
• unwashed masses
• unwashedness

 

Translations

not washed

• Danish: uvasket
• Dutch: ongewassen (nl)
• German: ungewaschen
• Gothic: 𐌿𐌽𐌸𐍅𐌰𐌷𐌰𐌽𐍃 (unþwahans)
• Greek: άνιφτος (el) (ániftos)

  Ancient: ἄνιπτος (ániptos), ἄπλυτος (áplutos)

• Ingrian: pesemätöin
• Manx: neuoonlit (person), neunieet (thing), neughlen (thing)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: uvasket

  Nynorsk: uvaska