Word.ws English Dictionary

endware

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Early/ˈɛndˌwæːr/

endware noun: a hamlet or township; a small settlement or locality.

Noun

endware (plural endwares)

  1. (Early, Essex, Modern, Northwestern, rare) A hamlet or township; a small settlement or locality.
    • To the poor people 6s. 8d. to be paid to the churchwardens to distribute to 40 of the poorest householders at their discretion, only 'this endware to be none of them' [sic].1994 [1570/1], “WILLIAM HAISTLER of Finchingfield, 2 Feb. 1570/1 (418)”, in F.G. Emmison, editor, Essex wills: the Bishop of London's Commissary Court, 1569-1578 (Essex Record Office Publication...
    • Yet herin I will commẽde manye of the monaſticall votaries, eſpeciallye Monkes, foꝛ that they were authors of many goodly boꝛowes and endwares, neare vnto their dwellinges, although otherwyſe they pꝛetended to be men ſeparated from the woꝛld.1577, William Harrison, “An Historicall Description of the Islande of Britayne, […]”, in The Firste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande […], volume I, London: […] [Henry...

Forms of endware

pluralendwares

Origin of endware

Inherited from Middle English *endeware, from Old English *endeware (literally “village people”), from ende (“end, extremity”) + -ware (“inhabitants”), metonymically extended from the inhabitants of a settlement to the settlement itself. Compare endship for a similar formation.

Questions about endware

What does endware mean?
Endware means a hamlet or township; a small settlement or locality.
What part of speech is endware?
Endware is a noun.
How do you pronounce endware?
Endware is pronounced /ˈɛndˌwæːr/ (Early).
What is the plural of endware?
The plural of endware is endwares.

Words near endware in the dictionary

  1. enduros
  2. endwall
  3. endwalls
  4. endward
  5. endwards
  6. endware
  7. endwares
  8. endways
  9. Endwell
  10. endwise
  11. endwork

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: endware (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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