wisp

Meanings

Noun

• A small bundle, as of straw or other like substance; any slender, flexible structure or group.
• A whisk, or small broom.
• A will o' the wisp, or ignis fatuus.
• An immeasurable, indefinable essence of life; soul.
• A flock of snipe.
• A disease affecting the feet of cattle.

Verb

• To brush or dress, as with a wisp.
• To rumple.
• To produce a wisp, as of smoke.
• To emit in wisps.

Origin

• From Middle English wispe, wyspe, wips, wipse, perhaps from an unrecorded Old English *wisp, *wips. Cognate with West Frisian wisp, Dutch wisp, Norwegian bokmål/Swedish/Bornholm Danish visp. Akin also to Middle Dutch/Middle Low German wispel.