mote

• (General American) IPA^(key): /moʊt/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /məʊt/
• Rhymes: -əʊt
• Homophone: moat

From Middle English mot, from Old English mot (“grain of sand; mote; atom”), but of uncertain ultimate origin. Sometimes linked to Spanish mota (“speck”) and English mud.[1].

Compare West Frisian mot (“peat dust”), Dutch mot (“dust from turf; sawdust; grit”), Norwegian mutt (“speck; mote; splinter; chip”).

mote (plural motes)

1. A small particle; a speck.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), imprinted at London: By Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, Matthew 7:5:

     Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.

   • before 1729, Edward Taylor, "Meditation. Joh. 14.2. I go to prepare a place for you":

     What shall a Mote up to a Monarch rise?

     An Emmet match an Emperor in might?

   • 1979, J.G. Ballard, The Unlimited Dream Company, chapter 9:

     I wanted to shrink myself to a mote of dust, plunge into this pool I held in my own cyclopean hands, soar down these runs of light to places where light itself was born from this colloquy of dust.

• floater

From Middle English moten, from Old English mōtan (“to be allowed, be able to, have the opportunity to, be compelled to, may, must”), from Proto-Germanic *mōtaną (“to be able to, have to, be delegated”), from Proto-Indo-European *med- (“to acquire, possess, be in charge of”). Cognate with Dutch moeten (“to have to, must”), German müssen (“to have to, must”), Danish måtte (“might, may”), Ancient Greek μέδω (médō, “to prevail, dominate, rule over”). Related to empty.

mote (third-person singular simple present mote, present participle -, simple past and past participle must)

1. (now archaic) May or might. [from 9th c.]
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, VI.7:

     he […] kept aloofe for dread to be descryde, / Untill fit time and place he mote espy, / Where he mote worke him scath and villeny.

2. (obsolete) Must. [9th-17th c.]
3. (now archaic) Forming subjunctive expressions of wish: may. [from 9th c.]
   • 1980, Erica Jong, Fanny:

     ‘I shall not take Vengeance into my own Hands. The Goddess will do what She will.’ ‘So mote it be,’ said the Grandmaster.

• Generally takes an infinitive without to.

See moot (“a meeting”).

mote (plural motes)

1. (obsolete) A meeting for discussion.

   a wardmote in the city of London

2. (obsolete) A body of persons who meet for discussion, especially about the management of affairs.

   a folk mote

3. (obsolete) A place of meeting for discussion.

• folk-mote
• mote bell
• shire-mote

From remote, with allusion to the other sense of mote (“a speck of dust”).

mote (plural motes)

1. A tiny computer for remote sensing; a component element of smartdust.

• -tome, Tome, tome

From Proto-Samic *moδē.

mote

1. mud

• Entry 38643 in Álgu database

mote f pl

1. plural of mota

• temo

mote

1. Rōmaji transcription of もて

mōte

1. vocative masculine singular of mōtus

From French mode

mote m (definite singular moten, indefinite plural moter, definite plural motene)

1. fashion

• motebevisst
• motehus
• moteshow
• moteverden

• “mote” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

From French mode

mote m (definite singular moten, indefinite plural motar, definite plural motane)

1. fashion

• motebevisst
• motehus
• moteshow
• motemedveten, motemedviten

• “mote” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

mote m (plural motes)

1. motto

• IPA^(key): /ˈmote/, [ˈmot̪e]

From French or Provençal mot (“saying”).

mote m (plural motes)

1. nickname
2. motto (heraldry)

• motejar

Borrowed from Quechua mut'i.

mote m (plural motes)

1. (South America) hulled cereal, especially pearl barley and hominy

• mote de maíz
• mote de trigo

mote

1. dative singular of mot