clod

From Middle English clod, a late by-form of clot, from Old English clot, from Proto-West Germanic *klott (“mass, ball, clump”). Compare clot and cloud; cognate to Dutch klodde (“rag”) and kloot (“clod”).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /klɒd/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /klɑd/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒd, -ɑːd

clod (plural clods)

1. A lump of something, especially of earth or clay.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], OCLC 228722708; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, OCLC 230729554:

     clods of iron and brass

   • 1600, Edward Fairfax (translator), originally published in 1581 by Torquato Tasso, w:Jerusalem Delivered

     clods of blood

   • 1631, Francis [Bacon], “(please specify |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], 3rd edition, London: […] William Rawley; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], OCLC 1044372886:

     The earth that casteth up from the plough a great clod, is not so good as that which casteth up a smaller clod.

   • 1903, Warwick Deeping, Uther and Igraine

     As for yon clod of clay, we will bury it later, lest it should pollute so goodly a pool.

   • 1906, Mark Twain, Eve's Diary

     One of the clods took it back of the ear, and it used language. It gave me a thrill, for it was the first time I had ever heard speech, except my own.

   • 2010, Clare Vanderpool, Moon Over Manifest

     "What a bunch of hooey," I said under my breath, tossing a dirt clod over my shoulder against the locked-up garden shed.

2. The ground; the earth; a spot of earth or turf.
   • 1723, Jonathan Swift, Pethox the Great

     the clod where once their sultan's horse hath trod

3. A stupid person; a dolt.
   • 1675, John Dryden, Aureng-zebe: A Tragedy. […], London: […] T[homas] N[ewcomb] for Henry Herringman, […], published 1676, OCLC 228724395, Act I, page 3:

     The vulgar, a scarce animated clod

   • 1906, Robert Barr, The Triumphs of Eugène Valmont

     'What was its number?'
     'I don't know, sir.'
     'You clod! Why didn't you call one of our men, whoever was nearest, and leave him to shadow the American while you followed the cab?'

   • 1986 February 14, Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

     So here's a valentine for you, you insensitive clod!!

   • 1998, Chickenpox (episode of South Park TV series)

     Gerald Broflovski: You see Kyle, we humans work as a society, and in order for a society to thrive, we need gods and clods.

   • 2015, "Jail Break" (episode of Steven Universe TV series)

     Peridot: Don't touch that! You clods don't know what you're doing!

4. Part of a shoulder of beef, or of the neck piece near the shoulder.

• cloddy

clod (third-person singular simple present clods, present participle clodding, simple past and past participle clodded)

1. (transitive) To pelt with clods.
   • 1906, Mark Twain, Eve's Diary

     "When I went there yesterday evening in the gloaming it had crept down and was trying to catch the little speckled fishes that play in the pool, and I had to clod it to make it go up the tree again and let them alone."

   • 1959, Louis L'Amour, The First Fast Draw

     when I came out and started to hoist it to the mule's back they rushed at me and jerked my suspenders down and then they clodded me with chunks of dirt

2. (transitive, Scotland) To throw violently; to hurl.
   • 1815 February 24, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume (please specify |volume=I, II, or III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Archibald Constable and Co., […], OCLC 742335644:

     "So, sir, she grippit him, and clodded him like a stane from the sling ower the craigs of Warroch-head"

3. To collect into clods, or into a thick mass; to coagulate; to clot.
   • 1610, Giles Fletcher, Christ's Victorie and Triumph

     Clodded in lumps of clay.

clod in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913

• cold, loc'd

• clodd, clodde, cludde

A late by-form of clot of unclear provenance. Compare Old English *clod, a form of clot found in compounds and placenames.

• IPA^(key): /klɔd/

clod (plural cloddes)

1. A clod; a ball of earth or clay.
2. (rare) A clot or clump of blood.
3. (rare) A shoulder of beef.

• clodred
• clodden
• cloddre

• English: clod
• Scots: clod

• “clod, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.

From Proto-Brythonic *klod, from Proto-Celtic *klutom (“rumour; fame”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱlew- (“heard, famous”) (whence also clywed (“to hear”)).

• IPA^(key): /kloːd/

clod m (plural clodydd)

1. praise, renown, credit
2. distinction (in exam results)

• anghlod (“dispraise”)
• canu clodydd (“to sing the praises of”)
• clodfawr (“famous, renowned”)
• clodwiw (“praiseworthy”)

• R. J. Thomas, G. A. Bevan, P. J. Donovan, A. Hawke et al., editors (1950–present), “clod”, in Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru Online (in Welsh), University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies