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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

smut.

Soot.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/smʌt//smʊt/Northern-England
  1. Soot.

    uncountable
  2. A flake of ash or soot.

    countable
  3. Sexually vulgar material; something that is sexual in a dirty way; pornographic material.

    uncountable
  4. Obscene language; ribaldry; obscenity.

    uncountable
  5. Any of a range of fungi, mostly Ustilaginomycetes, that cause plant disease in grasses, including cereal crops; the disease so caused.

    countable · uncountable
  6. Bad, soft coal containing earthy matter, found in the immediate locality of faults.

    countable · uncountable
  7. A copper boiler.

    archaic · countable · slang
Where this word comes from

From Middle English smutten (“to defile, debase”), related to German Schmutz (“filth, dirt, smut”) and schmutzen (“to make dirty, stain”). Doublet of schmutz. Compare also Old English smitta (“smear; blot; mark; stain; pollution”), Old English besmītan (“to besmut; defile; dirty; pollute; contaminate”).

verb/smʌt//smʊt/Northern-England
  1. To stain (or be stained) with soot or other dirt.

    ambitransitive
  2. To taint (grain, etc.) with the smut fungus.

    transitive
  3. To become tainted by the smut fungus.

    intransitive
  4. To clear of the smut fungus.

    transitive
    to smut grain for the mill
Where this word comes from

From Middle English smutten (“to defile, debase”), related to German Schmutz (“filth, dirt, smut”) and schmutzen (“to make dirty, stain”). Doublet of schmutz. Compare also Old English smitta (“smear; blot; mark; stain; pollution”), Old English besmītan (“to besmut; defile; dirty; pollute; contaminate”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.