rood

plural roods

1. archaicA crucifix, cross, especially in a church.

   Have you forgot me? No, by the rood, not so.

   c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iv]

   2 more examples

   The Citizens in their rage, imagining that euery poſt in the Churche had bin one of yᵉ Souldyers, ſhot habbe or nabbe at randon^([sic – meaning random]) uppe to the Roode lofte, and to the Chancell, leauing ſome of theyr arrowes ſticking in the Images.

   1577, Raphaell Holinshed; Richarde Stanyhurst [i.e., Richard Stanihurst], “[The Historie of Irelande […].] The Thirde Booke of the Historie of Ireland, Comprising the Raigne of Henry the Eyght: ….”, in The Firste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande […], volume I, London: […] [Henry Bynneman] for Iohn Hunne, →OCLC, pages 77–78, column 2

   By holy rood, a royal beard! / How say you? we have slept, my lords. / My beard has grown into my lap.

   1842, Alfred Tennyson, “The Day-Dream. The Revival.”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 157

2. A measure of land area, equal to a quarter of an acre.

   Perhaps, however, he could ensure against being completely alone by cultivating the few roods of garden wished upon him.

   1956, Anthony Burgess, Time for a Tiger (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 195

   2 more examples

   Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth / Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth, / Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood / Changes and off he goes!) within a rood— / Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.

   1855, Robert Browning, “‘Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came.’”, in Men and Women […], volume I, London: Chapman and Hall, […], →OCLC, stanza XXV

   […] a bumptious fool whose god was property, not property in vast estates such as a true man might worship, but in paltry roods.

   1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter V, in Capricornia, page 58

   Synonyms: farthingdale, day's work, daywork, farthing, ferling, farthingdeal, farthingdole, farundel

3. historicalChesterAn area of sixty-four square yards.
4. UKdialectalobsoleteA measure of five and a half yards in length.

   Thus Satan […] his other parts besides / Prone on the flood, extended long and large, / Lay floating many a rood […]

   1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC

5. archaicThe human face.

   Nou goth sonne under wode,— Me reweth, Marie, thi faire Rode. Nou goth sonne under tre,—

   13th century, Edmund of Abingdon (or Anonymous); reproduced in Carleton Fairchild Brown (ed.), English Lyrics of the XIIIth Century (1932), p. 1, from Bodl. MS. Arch. Selden 74, f.55v

plural Roods

1. A surname.