gilt

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ɡɪlt/, [ɡɪɫt]

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Audio (General American):

  (file)

• Homophone: guilt
• Rhymes: -ɪlt

Formed in English from the verb gild (“to cover in gold”). Compare gold and German Geld.

gilt (usually uncountable, plural gilts)

1. (uncountable) Gold or other metal in a thin layer; gilding.
   1. (uncountable, by extension) Gold-colored paint or other coating.
2. (uncountable, slang) Money.
   • 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, prologue]:

     three corrupted men […]
     Have, for the gilt of France,—O guilt indeed!—
     Confirm'd conspiracy with fearful France

3. (countable, finance, UK) A security issued by the Bank of England (see gilt-edged).
   • 2022 September 29, Kalyeena Makortoff, Sarah Butler, “‘I’d never seen anything like it’: how market turmoil sparked a pension fund selloff”, in The Guardian‎^[1]:

     However, as asset prices slumped over the week – including UK government bonds, or gilts – those banks required more collateral to offset the pension funds’ liabilities, forcing the funds to dump assets and raise cash at short notice.

4. (obsolete, uncountable) A gilded object, an object covered with gold.
   • 1864, “Returns of Church Goods in The Churches of the City of Norwich”, in Commission of 6 Edward VI‎^[2], 1552, quoted in Norfolk Archaeology, Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society, page 371:

     The parysh of Seint Powle in Norwiche. Thomas Blocke, George Wylson, Churchwardens. Have sold in plate, gylte and parcell gylte, to the summe of iiij ownce, every ownce at the price of iiijs. viijd.

gilt (comparative more gilt, superlative most gilt)

1. Golden coloured.
   • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter X, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:

     The Jones man was looking at her hard. Now he reached into the hatch of his vest and fetched out a couple of cigars, everlasting big ones, with gilt bands on them.

gilt

1. simple past and past participle of gild
   • 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 89:

     The sun was rising; it gilt the hill tops and gradually threw its lustre over the dark pine forests on the mountain slopes.

• parcel gilt

• “gilt, n.2.”, in OED Online  ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2018.

From Middle English gilt, gylt, from Old Norse gyltr; compare geld and yelt.

gilt (plural gilts)

1. (UK, regional) A young female pig, at or nearing the age of first breeding.

• yilt

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪlt

gilt

1. inflection of gillen:
   1. second/third-person singular present indicative
   2. (archaic) plural imperative

• ligt

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡɪlt/

• Audio:

  (file)

gilt

1. inflection of gelten:
   1. third-person singular present
   2. singular imperative

gilt

1. key

gilt

1. strong neuter nominative singular of gildr
2. strong neuter accusative singular of gildr