need-fire
need-fire noun: a ritual fire created by friction.
Noun
need-fire (plural need-fires)
- A ritual fire created by friction.
- In Silesia, also, need-fires were often employed for the purpose of curing a murrain or preventing its spread.1911, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 10, page 278
- Fire - divided into need-fire (kindled by friction - discussed under 'Waluburg's Night') and 'struck fire' (sparked by flint and steel - discussion under Thonar).1993, Our Troth, page 660
Examples of need-fire in a sentence
- I built up the kindling in various stages in the base of the stove as I prepared to make my need-fire.1998, Darien Hamilton, “Kindling in the Yuletide”, in Heathen Journal, volume 2, number 3:
- When great pestilence is upon the land, old folklore tells of using a bow drill to make the need-fire, which is then used to cure cattle of their illness.2003, Brian Froud, Ari Berk, The Runes of Elfland, page 51:
Forms of need-fire
| plural | need-fires |
|---|---|
| alternative form | needfire |
Origin of need-fire
Cognate to German Notfeuer.
Questions about need-fire
- What does need-fire mean?
- Need-fire means a ritual fire created by friction.
- How do you use need-fire in a sentence?
- I built up the kindling in various stages in the base of the stove as I prepared to make my need-fire.
- What part of speech is need-fire?
- Need-fire is a noun.
- What is the plural of need-fire?
- The plural of need-fire is need-fires.
Words near need-fire in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: need-fire (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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