Word.ws English Dictionary

danegeld

UK/ˈdeɪnɡɛld/

danegeld is the alternative letter-case form of Danegeld.

Noun capitalized: Danegeld

Danegeld (uncountable)

  1. A tax raised originally to pay tribute or protection money to the Viking raiders in the 10th and 11th centuries to save a land from being ravaged, and later continued as a land tax.
    • And who shall then stick closest to ye, and excite others? not he who takes up armes for cote and conduct, and his four nobles of Danegelt.1644, John Milton, Areopagitica
    Synonyms:
    heregeld
  2. (broadly) Any kind of tribute.
    • The best now pay danegeld to the sloths, the greedy, the manipulators. And congress has legitimized the channels of deceit through laws which pay danegeld to the most strident noise makers.1989, Irwin M. Ryan, The Last Congress, Remco, →ISBN
    • But this part of the industry still had to pay Danegeld to the already over-endowed City.1988, Ken Smith, Free is Cheaper

Synonyms of danegeld

Forms of danegeld

alternative formdanegeld
alternative formDanegelt
alternative formdanegelt

Origin of danegeld

Inherited from Middle English danegeld, from Dane, genitive plural of Dan (“Dane”), plus geld (“geld, tribute, payment”). Apparently modeled on a Scandinavian word such as Old Danish Danegjeld, from Old Norse *Danagjald, from the genitive plural of Danir (“Danes”) + gjald (“payment, tribute”).

Questions about danegeld

What does danegeld mean?
Danegeld means a tax raised originally to pay tribute or protection money to the Viking raiders in the 10th and 11th centuries to save a land from being ravaged, and later continued as a land tax.
What is danegeld the alternative letter-case form of?
Danegeld is the alternative letter-case form of Danegeld.
What part of speech is danegeld?
Danegeld is a noun.
How do you pronounce danegeld?
Danegeld is pronounced /ˈdeɪnɡɛld/ (UK).

Words near danegeld in the dictionary

  1. Dane-hole
  2. Dane-holes
  3. Dane-zaa
  4. Dane-ẕaa
  5. Danebrog
  6. danegeld
  7. Danegelt
  8. Danehower
  9. Danek
  10. Daneks
  11. Danelagh

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: danegeld (page history and authors); Danegeld (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “danegeld.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/danegeld. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.