Wuduweard

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An Old English term for an official who guards and looks after a forest or woodland on behalf of its owner
2. A warden charged with protecting a wood and overseeing the trees, game and land within it, as in medieval England
3. The keeper of a forest, responsible for patrolling the woodland and preventing poaching or unlawful cutting of timber

Etymology: Wuduweard is an Old English word, and its parts are fairly transparent: "wudu" meant "wood" or "forest," and "weard" meant "guard" or "keeper," so the compound described someone who watched over the woods. Its Old English spelling is the source of the modern "wood-ward," and the word appears in Old English texts as a term for a forest officer, a person charged with guarding woodland and its game. The word is a good example of how a job title can outlive the job. As forests were enclosed and managed under royal and manorial law, the forest warden's role grew into a formal office, and the Old English compound gave rise to later English forms such as "woodward." Those later forms survive mainly as surnames, which is where many readers will meet the word today.