Willow

How to spell willow

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce willow

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does willow mean?

1. nounA tree or shrub with narrow leaves and flexible branches, often growing near water.

Willow in a sentence

• A graceful willow leaned over the edge of the pond.

• The cricket bat was carved from seasoned willow wood.

Where does willow come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Willow descends from the Old English word welig, the native Anglo-Saxon name for the slender, water-loving tree. That form belongs to a wider Germanic family, with related words appearing in Old Saxon and Middle Dutch, all pointing back to a root that some scholars link to a sense of 'twisting' or 'pliant', a fitting description for the tree's supple, bendable branches. Over the centuries the original welig softened in pronunciation and spelling, the hard guttural giving way to the gentle -ow ending we write today. The willow has long carried associations of mourning and flexibility in English literature, and its bendy wands were prized for weaving baskets and making cricket bats. The chief spelling trap is simply the doubled l and the final -ow, which can tempt writers toward 'willo' or 'willoe'.

How the word is built

• willow (single root, from Old English welig); the modern -ow spelling reflects the softened ending of the old word