withershins

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

Alteration of widder- in widdershins (a borrowing from Middle Low German) after the English cognate form wither- (against, anti-).

Adverb[edit]

withershins (not comparable)

  1. Alternative form of widdershins (anticlockwise)
    • 1763, Allan Ramsay, The Gentle Shephard[1]:
      Boils up their Livers in a Warlock's pow, Rins withershins about the Hemlock low
    • 1933, W.B. Yeats, Coole Park, 1929:
      The intellectual sweetness of those lines / That cut through time or cross it withershins.