Word.ws English Dictionary

I wiss

I wiss adverb: surely, certainly; indeed, assuredly.

Adverb

I wiss (not comparable)

  1. (archaic, poetic) surely, certainly; indeed, assuredly
    • To tell the truth, I'm well informed / Yon match is a wile; The sheriff, I wiss, devises this / Us archers to beguile.1904, Child, Sargent, Kittredge, English and Scottish popular ballads
    • Such wholesome directions doth the bishop of Rome give unto those that will be ruled by him : far different (I wiss) from that holy doctrine, wherewith the Church of Rome was at first seasoned by the apostles [...]1631, James Ussher, Charles Richard Elrington, The whole works: Volume 4

Forms of I wiss

alternative formI wuss
alternative formI wis

Origin of I wiss

From an incorrect assumption made by editors where i-wiss, iwis (“certainly, for sure”) was hypercorrected to I wiss, as if wiss were a verb and I were the pronoun I. See also wiss, wis, iwis.

Questions about I wiss

What does I wiss mean?
I wiss means surely, certainly; indeed, assuredly.
What part of speech is I wiss?
I wiss is an adverb.

Words near I wiss in the dictionary

  1. I was born in ...
  2. I will yeah
  3. I wis
  4. I wish
  5. I wish I may be shot
  6. I wiss
  7. I would
  8. I would rather die
  9. I wouldn't piss on someone if they were on fire
  10. I Zingari
  11. I$

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: I wiss (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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