moot

From Middle English mōt, ȝemōt, from Old English *mōt, ġemōt (“meeting”), from Proto-Germanic [Term?], from Proto-Indo-European *meh₂d- (“to encounter, come”). Cognate with Scots mut, mote (“meeting, assembly”), Low German Mööt (“meeting”), Moot (“meeting”), archaic Dutch (ge)moet (“meeting”), Danish møde (“meeting”), Swedish möte (“meeting”), Norwegian møte (“meeting”), Icelandic mót (“meeting, tournament, meet”). Related to meet.

• enPR: mo͞ot, IPA^(key): /muːt/

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• Audio (AU)

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• Rhymes: -uːt

moot (comparative more moot, superlative most moot)

1. (current in UK, rare in the US) Subject to discussion (originally at a moot); arguable, debatable, unsolved or impossible to solve.
   • 1770, Joseph Banks, The Endeavour Journal of Sir Joseph Banks, January 4, 1770 (published 1962):

     […] :indeed we were obligd to hawl off rather in a hurry for the wind freshning a little we found ourselves in a bay which it was a moot point whether or not we could get out of: […]

   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “Chapter 32”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, OCLC 57395299:

     [T]he uncertain, unsettled condition of this science of Cetology is in the very vestibule attested by the fact, that in some quarters it still remains a moot point whether a whale be a fish.

   • 1903, Walter Crane and Lewis F. Day, Moot Points: Friendly Disputes on Art and Industry Between Walter Crane and Lewis F. Day
   • 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin 2003, p. 477:

     The extent to which these Parisian radicals ‘represented’ the French people as a whole was very moot.

2. (Canada, US, chiefly law) Being an exercise of thought; academic.
3. (Canada, US) Having no practical consequence or relevance.

   Synonyms: irrelevant, (if it was previously relevant) obsolete

   That point may make for a good discussion, but it is moot.

   • 2007, Paul Mankowski, "The Languages of Biblical Translation", Adoremus Bulletin, Vol. 13, No. 4,

     The question [whether certain poetry was present in the original Hebrew Psalms] in our own time is moot, since various considerations have made it certain that, of all the hazards presented by biblical translation, a dangerous excess of beauty is not one of them.

• moot point
• moot court
• ward moot

moot (plural moots)

1. A moot court.
   • 1531, Thomas Elyot, Ernest Rhys, editor, The Boke Named the Governour […] (Everyman’s Library), London: J[oseph] M[alaby] Dent & Co; New York, N.Y.: E[dward] P[ayson] Dutton & Co, published [1907], OCLC 1026313858:

     The pleading used in courts and chancery called moots.

2. A system of arbitration in many areas of Africa in which the primary goal is to settle a dispute and reintegrate adversaries into society rather than assess penalties.
3. (Scouting) A gathering of Rovers, usually in the form of a camp lasting 2 weeks.
4. (paganism) A social gathering of pagans, normally held in a public house.
5. (historical) An assembly (usually for decision-making in a locality). [from the 12th c.]
6. (shipbuilding) A ring for gauging wooden pins.

• folkmoot
• gemoot

From Middle English moten (“to speak, talk, converse, discuss”), from Old English mōtian (“to speak, converse, discuss”). See also mutter (which is a frequentative of moot).

moot (third-person singular simple present moots, present participle mooting, simple past and past participle mooted)

1. To bring up as a subject for debate, to propose.
   • 1960 January, “Talking of Trains: N.& W.-Virginian merger”, in Trains Illustrated, page 9:

     A number of other mergers of U.S. railroads are mooted, but the I.C.C. [Interstate Commerce Commission] has made it clear that its assent to the N.& W.-Virginian proposal, which was unopposed by competitors or stockholders, should not be taken as an indication that others will swiftly pass its scrutiny.

2. To discuss or debate.
   • 1859–1860, William Hamilton, H[enry] L[ongueville] Mansel and John Veitch, editors, Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, OCLC 648725:

     a problem which hardly has been mentioned, far less mooted, in this country

   • 1531, Thomas Elyot, Ernest Rhys, editor, The Boke Named the Governour […] (Everyman’s Library), London: J[oseph] M[alaby] Dent & Co; New York, N.Y.: E[dward] P[ayson] Dutton & Co, published [1907], OCLC 1026313858:

     First a case is appointed to be mooted by certain young men, containing some doubtful controversy.

   • 2015 March 4, Peter Shadbolt, “Amazing Cycle Super Highways”, in CNN‎, retrieved 2015-03-11:

     An elevated cycleway connecting Los Angeles and Pasadena was mooted as early as 1896 …

3. (US) To make or declare irrelevant.
4. To argue or plead in a supposed case.
   • 1641, Ben Jonson, Timber

     There is a difference between mooting and pleading; between fencing and fighting.

5. (regional, obsolete) To talk or speak.

   'Tis no boot to moot again of it.

   • 1535, William Stewart, The Buik of the Croniclis of Scotland:

     In that mater now I will mute no moir.

6. (Scotland, Northern England) To say, utter, also insinuate.

   He could not moot the words.

In the fifth sense, usually found in the archaic phrase no boot to moot, as inː it's no boot to moot with her (it is no use to talk/reason/plead with her).

In rural northern dialects of the UK, usually used together with the verbs mell and spell, where moot is used instead of talk and say; mell used instead of speak and converse; and spell instead of tell and relate. The verb moot in the sense to talk, say, utter etc., is part of an informal in-group speak or register wherein speakers (mostly of northern dialects) use this and the above-mentioned words when talking with one another and when talking with outsiders or strangers they, usually, only use the words like say, talk, speak etc. For example, if a mother is talking with her child she is much more likely to use words like moot, mell and spell, however if she is speaking with a stranger from the South she is extremely unlikely to use such words. Also, such words are usually considered taboo in formal contexts.

moot (plural moots)

1. (Scotland, Northern England) A whisper, or an insinuation, also gossip or rumors.

   Na, I haven't heard a moot of it.

   Haven't you heard the moot, mate? There are going to be layoffs.

2. (Scotland, Northern England, rural) Talk.

   No, there's no moot of it on the streets.

   There's some moot of charges, but nothing concrete yet.

• bosworthtoller.com
• The Middle English Dictionary
• The Dictionary of the Scots Language

• Moot Hall

Unknown.

• IPA^(key): /ˈmʊt/

moot (plural moots)

1. (Australia) Vagina.

• The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, 2005, →ISBN, pages vol. 2, p. 1320

From Dutch moot (“piece”).

moot (plural moots)

1. (West Country) The stump of a tree; the roots and bottom end of a felled tree.
   • 1903, Barnes, William, “My Orcha'd in Linden Lea”, in Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect:

     'Ithin the woodlands, flow'ry gleäded, / By the woak tree's mossy moot

• moot-axe, mooting-axe
• moot earth
• moot-end

moot (third-person singular simple present moots, present participle mooting, simple past and past participle mooted)

1. (West Country) To take root and begin to grow.
2. (West Country) To turn up soil or dig up roots, especially an animal with a snout.
   • 1867, Rock, William Frederick, Jim and Nell‎, page 24:

     "Zarch tha whole worl', vrom Guenever / To Squier Mules' ta Muddever, / Moot iv'ry brack about un.

Clipping of mutual with humorously altered pronunciation.

moot (plural moots)

1. (Internet slang, endearing) A mutual follower on a social media platform.
   • 2020, @healer_katara, "Café au Twitter", ZaofuToday, Issue 1, page 10:

     Eid Mubarak to all my muslim moots out there

   • 2021, @DIORJAEYUN, "NCity Small Business", EnVi, Winter 2021, page 222:

     I just simply post them in my main Twitter account, then hoping that my moots will like and retweet them.

   • 2022, anonymous, quoted in Fayika Farhat Nova et al., "Cultivating the Community: Inferring Influence Within Eating Disorder Networks on Twitter", Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, January 2022 (article link):

     RT: hi..jst joined #edtwt! let’s be moots and rt each other

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:moot.

• Wright, Joseph (1903) The English Dialect Dictionary‎, volume 4, Oxford: Oxford University Press, page 157

• MOTO, moto, moto-, tomo-, toom

• Hyphenation: mo‧ot
• IPA^(key): /moˈʔot/

mòot

1. Misspelling of muot.

Ultimately related to Proto-Germanic *maitaną. This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

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• Rhymes: -oːt

moot m (plural moten, diminutive mootje n)

1. A thick slice or a cut, especially of fish.
2. (by extension) A chunk of any whole; a part.

• hoofdmoot (“main part, plurality, majority”)
• zalmmoot (“salmon chunk”)

• → Papiamentu: mochi (from the diminutive)

• toom

From Old Norse móta.

• IPA^(key): /²muːt/, [mɯ̀ᵝːt]

  Rhymes: -ùːt

moot (preterite mote)

1. To shape (press) something in a mould.

• mot

moot

1. nominative/accusative plural of mot