from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
noun A small scrap or leaving of food after a meal is completed.
noun A scrap; a bit.
from The Century Dictionary.
noun A money of account in Germany, Norway, Denmark, Riga, etc.
noun A Danish unit of weight, the thousandth part of the pund or pound.
To turn away from with disgust; refuse.
noun A vector of unit length.
noun A fragment; a scrap; a piece of refuse: usually in the plural.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
noun A morsel left at a meal; a fragment; refuse; -- commonly used in the plural.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
noun A fragment; a scrap of leftover food; any remainder; a piece of refuse.
verb transitive, dialectal To turn away from with disgust; refuse.
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
[Middle English orte, food left by animals, probably from Middle Dutch : oor, out; see ud- in Indo-European roots + eten, to eat; see ed- in Indo-European roots.]
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
From Middle English ort, from Old English *orǣt ("that which is left after eating", literally "out-eat"), equivalent to or- + eat. Cognate with Middle Low German orte ("refuse of food"), Middle Dutch ooraete, ooreete, Low German ort ("ort").
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word ort.
Examples
An ghaoth ag breith ort is ag tarraingt ar do �ada�
If you didn't see it, the day after her death The Newshour rebroadcast an essay of hers from 1986 about art in Texas -- or as Molly pronounces it, "ort" -- an appreciation for the colorful and absurd in Texas.
The company's Gattex drug was successful in a late-stage study in treating patients with sh ort bowel syndrome, reducing the amount of intravenous nutrition needed by patients with the condition.
I didn't see it in the theatre, and I'm s ort of sad about that now because it was very pretty and I imagine it would have been improved by being very big.
[T] ort reform ‘will not eliminate the market dynamics that lead to insurance cycles,’ and ‘we must not over-promise — or even imply — that insurance cycles will end when civil justice reform begins.’
In other words, if this whole other-chick subplot is anything more than a conversational ort relative to the cake of your time together (see, I can torture a dessert metaphor, too), then that's a bad sign.
A fragment of food left over from a meal; fodder left by cattle; a refuse scrap; leavings. Usu. in pl. Also fig.: a fragment, esp. of wisdom, wit, knowledge, etc. (OED online)
My use of ort (Sing.) refers to a bit of food lodged between the teeth, dislodged and spit out. That certainly meets the definition: " A fragment of food left over from a meal:".
chained_bear commented on the word ort
A fragment of food left over from a meal; fodder left by cattle; a refuse scrap; leavings. Usu. in pl. Also fig.: a fragment, esp. of wisdom, wit, knowledge, etc. (OED online)
February 5, 2007
reesetee commented on the word ort
Also see urt.
Mollusque, would this be appropriate for your "Lees" list?
October 13, 2008
mollusque commented on the word ort
I have it as orts. But thanks for thinking of me!
October 14, 2008
reesetee commented on the word ort
You bet.
October 14, 2008
grandpa27 commented on the word ort
My use of ort (Sing.) refers to a bit of food lodged between the teeth, dislodged and spit out. That certainly meets the definition: " A fragment of food left over from a meal:".
July 2, 2011