Past tense of whet
regular verb
The past tense of whet is whetted. The past participle is also whetted.
Forms of whet
| Base form (V1) | whet /ˈwɛt/ |
|---|---|
| Past tense (V2) | whetted |
| Past participle (V3) | whetted |
| Present participle | whetting |
| Third person singular | whets |
Less standard forms: whet (nonstandard).
Whetted in a sentence
- Salt's book whetted my appetite for dietetic studies.1925-29, Mahadev Desai (translator), M.K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Part I, chapter xv
- The inside of a valve has whetted parts constructed of corrosion-resistant material.From the entry whetted
- With his whetted dagger he slit a gash in the serpent's middle.1961, Norma Lorre Goodrich, “Beowulf”, in The Medieval Myths, New York: The New American Library, page 46. From the entry gash
- De Mandat-Grancey's interest in America was whetted further by a dashing and somewhat mysterious ex-Confederate soldier named Gifford F.1984, Howard R[oberts] Lamar, “Introduction”, in E[dmond] de Mandat-Grancey, translated by William Conn, Cow-boys and Colonels: Narrative…. From the entry freewheeling
- These two tours had whetted the colonies' appetite for Royal visits, and by the turn of the century that appetite was positively selachian.1963, Walkabout, volume 29, page 12. From the entry selachian
Meaning of whet
- verb To sharpen (something, such as a knife or sword) by rubbing on an object, especially a whetstone; to hone.
- verb Of an animal such as a boar: to sharpen (its horns, teeth, tusks, etc.) by rubbing on a stone, etc., in preparation for an attack.
- verb To make more keen or to stimulate (someone's appetite, interest, etc.); to hone, to sharpen.
Questions about the past tense of whet
- What is the past tense of whet?
- The past tense of whet is whetted.
- What is the past participle of whet?
- The past participle of whet is whetted.
- Is whet a regular or irregular verb?
- Whet is a regular verb: its past tense doubles the last letter and adds -ed.
- Is whet correct?
- whet is marked nonstandard in Wiktionary. The usual past tense of whet is whetted.
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: whet (page history and authors) and the entries of its forms. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws left out forms marked obsolete, archaic, rare or dialectal and added the examples. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this page: “Past tense of whet.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/past-tense/whet. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.