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Ouse River

(z)

1. also Great Ouse River A river, about 240 km (150 mi) long, rising in south-central England and meandering east and northeast to the Wash, an inlet of the North Sea.

2. A river, about 100 km (60 mi) long, of northeast England flowing southeast to join the Trent River and form the Humber River. It is an important commercial waterway.

Word History: Ouse is a perfectly appropriate name for a river, but one whose etymological meaning is likely to raise a smile. The name of these two rivers is derived from the Celtic languages that were spoken in England before the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons in the British Isles. Their Celtic name, Ūsa, is derived from *udso-, "water," which is in turn derived from the Indo-European root *wed-, "wet, water." The same root *wed- gives us the English words water and wet as well. Thus the Ouse River etymologically is the "Water River" or the "Wet River." Of course, the speakers of early forms of the English language who borrowed the name from the Celts did not know the meaning of the word—as is rather frequently the case when foreign topographical terms are borrowed.

Indo-European & Semitic Roots Appendices

Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices:

Indo-European Roots

Semitic Roots

The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.

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