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Origin and history of wood

wood(n.)

Old English wudu, earlier widu "tree, trees collectively, forest, grove; the substance of which trees are made," from Proto-Germanic *widu-, from PIE *widhu- "tree, wood" (source also of Welsh gwydd "trees," Gaelic fiodh- "wood, timber," Old Irish fid "tree, wood"). Germanic cognates include Old Norse viðr, Danish and Swedish ved "tree, wood," Old High German witu "wood."

Sometimes in Old English it was used generically for "wild" as opposed to "domesticated" (wudubucca "wild goat," wudufugol "wild bird," wudurose "wild rose;" wudu-honig "wild honey;" wudu-æppel "crab-apple"), perhaps reflecting the dense forests that carpeted much of old England just beyond the cultivated areas.

As "printing wood-blocks," as distinguished from metallic types, by 1839. Used for the largest-size characters ("Japan Surrenders"), in tabloid newspapers it came to be shorthand for "lead headline."

As an adjective, "made of wood, wooden," by 1530s.

Out of the woods, figuratively "safe," is by 1792.

wood(adj.)

"violently insane, mad, frantic" (senses now obsolete), Middle English wode, from Old English wod "mad, frenzied," from Proto-Germanic *woda-, reconstructed in Watkins to be from PIE *wet- (1) "to blow; inspire, spiritually arouse," source of Latin vates "seer, poet," Old Irish faith "poet;" "with a common element of mental excitement" [Buck].

Germanic cognates include Gothic woþs "possessed, mad," Old High German wuot "mad, madness," German wut "rage, fury." Also compare Old English woþ "sound, melody, song," Old Norse oðr "poetry," and the god-name Odin.

To do something "like mad" in Middle English might be to do it woodiwise (c. 1300) or for wood (late 14c.). Brain-wood was "mindless, out of control;" word-wood "unrestrained in speech."

Potential confusions with wood (n.) might have discouraged its use. The same verb, wõden, in 15c. could mean "take to the woods" (from hunting) or "be or go mad, rave, rage."

Related: Woodship "state of madness, frenzy, rage;" woodness, woodhede "unsoundness of mind, mental disorder."

Entries linking to wood

Odin

chief Teutonic god, the All-Father, a 19c. revival in reference to Scandinavian neo-paganism, from Danish, from Old Norse Oðinn, from Proto-Germanic *Wodanaz, name of the chief Germanic god (source of Old English Woden, Old High German Wuotan), from PIE *wod-eno-, *wod-ono- "raging, mad, inspired." Related: Odinism (1796 in reference to the ancient religion; by 1855 in reference to a modern Germanic revival).

backwoods(n.)

"wooded or partially uncleared and unsettled districts in remote regions," 1709, North American English; see back (adj.) + wood (n.) in the sense "forested tract." As an adjective, from 1784.

BACKWOODSMEN. ... This word is commonly used as a term of reproach (and that, only in a familiar style,) to designate those people, who, being at a distance from the sea and entirely agricultural, are considered as either hostile or indifferent to the interests of the commercial states. [John Pickering, "A Vocabulary, or Collection of Words and Phrases Which Have Been Supposed to be Peculiar to the United States of America," Boston, 1816]