Wooden

How to spell wooden

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce wooden

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does wooden mean?

1. adjectiveMade of or consisting of wood.
2. adjectiveStiff, awkward, or lacking natural expression and warmth.

Wooden in a sentence

• The cottage had a heavy wooden door with iron hinges.

• His wooden delivery made the speech feel rehearsed and lifeless.

• She stored the cutlery in a wooden drawer beneath the counter.

• The lead actor gave a wooden performance that drew poor reviews.

Where does wooden come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a native English word, built from the Old English wudu, meaning 'tree' or 'the timber cut from trees', plus the old adjective ending -en that signals 'made of', the same ending preserved in words like golden, woollen and earthen. The form wooden, meaning literally 'made of wood', became common in the 1500s, gradually replacing the older bare use of wood as an adjective. From its concrete sense the word picked up a vivid figurative meaning by the 1600s: a person or performance described as wooden moves or speaks as stiffly and lifelessly as a plank. The spelling keeps the double o of wood, and the single n of the suffix is the only real point to watch, since the word never doubles that consonant.

How the word is built

• wood (timber, the substance of trees)
• -en (adjective suffix meaning 'made of')