Word.ws English Dictionary

swath

UK/swɒθ//swɑθ/

swath noun: the track cut out by a scythe in mowing.

Noun (1)

swath (plural swaths)

  1. The track cut out by a scythe in mowing.
  2. (figuratively, often) A broad sweep or expanse, such as of land or of people.
    • A large swath of the population is opposed to this government policy.
    • Five days after Hurricane Katrina, large swaths of New Orleans are still submerged in water.

Noun (2) capitalized: SWATH

SWATH

  1. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of small waterplane area twin hull, a ship design philosophy for reducing pitching and rolling, and increasing stability, in all sea states.

swath meaning in Arabic

swath in Arabic

The track cut out by a scythe in mowing
مَمَرّ mamarr

Examples of swath in a sentence

  • With MANAMANA we capture an enormous swath of the American technology industry.
  • The Holy Roman emperor Charlemagne once ruled a swath of western Europe from Aachen.
  • Huge swaths of Port-au-Prince lay in ruins, and thousands of people were feared dead in the rubble.

All 26 example sentences with swath

Forms of swath

pluralswaths
alternative formswathe

Plural of swath: swaths

Origin of swath

From Middle English swath, swathe, from Old English swæþ, swaþu (“track; trace; footstep”), from Proto-Germanic *swaþō (“a wind-swept place; open field”), of unknown further origin. Has been derived from a Proto-Indo-European *swey- (“to bend, turn, swing”), and compared with Ancient Greek σιμός (simós, “snub-nosed”) and Welsh chwil (“reeling, staggering”), though this is uncertain, as well as the Greek comparandum being unlikely. Cognate with Dutch zwade, zwad (“swath; windrow”), German Schwade (“swath; windrow”), Icelandic svæði (“area; zone; sector; region”). other etymological information Corresponds to Middle Low German and Middle Dutch swat, Middle High German and MNG swade, NDu swad(e), Old Frisian swethe (“border”). Root meaning: trace of a cut. Attested in English since 888 in its obsolete meaning of track or trace, since 1475 in its more modern usage. Cognate with German Schwaden (“row of mown grass or grain”). No definite cognates outside Germanic languages. * See F. Kluge, Etymologisches Wörterbuch (De Gruyter), entry Schwaden, and OED.

Words formed from swath

Phrases with swath

Words that rhyme with swath

Questions about swath

What does swath mean?
Swath means the track cut out by a scythe in mowing.
What is swath in Arabic?
Swath in Arabic is مَمَرّ (mamarr). See Swath meaning in Arabic.
What part of speech is swath?
Swath is a noun.
How do you pronounce swath?
Swath is pronounced /swɒθ/ (UK).
What is the plural of swath?
The plural of swath is swaths.

Words near swath in the dictionary

  1. swatchway
  2. swatchways
  3. swate
  4. Swatek
  5. Swateks
  6. swath
  7. swathe
  8. swathed
  9. swather
  10. swathers
  11. swathes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: swath (page history and authors); SWATH (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-swath.ogg.

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