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Whittle vs Dissipate - What's the difference?

whittle | dissipate |

As verbs the difference between whittle and dissipate

is that whittle is (transitive|or|intransitive) to cut or shape wood with a knife while dissipate is to drive away, disperse.

As a noun whittle

is a knife; especially, a pocket knife, sheath knife, or clasp knife or whittle can be (archaic) a coarse greyish double blanket worn by countrywomen, in the west of england, over the shoulders, like a cloak or shawl.

whittle

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl)

Noun

(en noun)
  • A knife; especially, a pocket knife, sheath knife, or clasp knife.
  • * Dryden
  • A butcher's whittle .
  • * Macaulay
  • Rude whittles .
  • * Betterton
  • He wore a Sheffield whittle in his hose.

    Verb

    (whittl)
  • (transitive, or, intransitive) To cut or shape wood with a knife.
  • To reduce or gradually eliminate something (such as a debt).
  • (figurative) To make eager or excited; to excite with liquor; to inebriate.
  • * Withals
  • When men are well whittled , their tongues run at random.
    Derived terms
    * whittle down * whittling

    Etymology 2

    From an (etyl) word for "white"; akin to an Icelandic word for a white bedcover.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (archaic) A coarse greyish double blanket worn by countrywomen, in the west of England, over the shoulders, like a cloak or shawl.
  • (Charles Kingsley)
  • (archaic) A whittle shawl; a kind of fine woollen shawl, originally and especially a white one.
  • References

    *

    dissipate

    English

    Verb

    (dissipat)
  • To drive away, disperse.
  • * Cook
  • I soon dissipated his fears.
  • * Hazlitt
  • The extreme tendency of civilization is to dissipate all intellectual energy.
  • To use up or waste.
  • * Bishop Burnet
  • The vast wealth was in three years dissipated .
  • * 1931 :
  • So much for the effort and ingenuity of Montmartre. All the catering to vice and waste was on an utterly childish scale, and he suddenly realized the meaning of the word "dissipate'"—to ' dissipate into thin air; to make nothing out of something.
  • To vanish by dispersion.