Added 6 October 2026
hearth
/ˈhɑːθ/ noun
In Latin: focus Wiktionary
noun Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about hearth at Wordnik → Where our words come from →
- The place in a home where a fire is or was traditionally kept for home heating and for cooking, usually constituted by at least a hearthstone and often enclosed to varying degrees by any combination of reredos, fireplace, oven, smoke hood, or chimney.
-
A hearthstone, either as standalone or as the floor of an enclosed fireplace or oven.
cooking on an open hearth
- A fireplace: an open recess in a wall at the base of a chimney where a fire may be built.
Origin
From Middle English herth, herthe, from Old English heorþ, from Proto-West Germanic *herþ, from Proto-Germanic *herþaz, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *kerh₃- (“heat; fire”). Cognate with West Frisian hurd, Dutch haard, German Herd, Swedish härd. First attested in the Old English period. The modern spelling is from an Middle English/Early Modern English /hɛːrθ/, from earlier /heːrθ/, levelled from inflected forms with /rð/ where the vowel would have been lengthened. The reflex of this pronunciation was preserved in obsolete dialectal /ˈhɜɹθ/.
From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)