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haft

UK/hɑːft/US/hæft/
nounC2Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #14,430 of 15,258leans written

Other forms: hafts

A haft is the handle of a knife or an axe. A wooden haft, grip the haft, the haft split.

It is the technical word a maker uses where a user would say handle, and how it is fitted to the head is most of what decides whether a tool is safe. It is an old English word from the same root as heft, meaning weight or to lift.

Definitions of haft

  1. 1nounhaftThe handle of a knife or an axe.C2

    “The axe head flew off its wooden haft and landed in the grass.”

haft is a handle.

Where it comes from

Old English haeft means a handle, from a Germanic root meaning to seize. Heft is a relative.

  1. Proto-Indo-European

    *kap-

  2. Proto-Germanic

    *haftiją

  3. Proto-West Germanic

    *haftī

  4. Old English

    hæft

  5. Middle English

    haft

  6. English, today

    haft

From Middle English haft, from Old English hæft, from Proto-West Germanic haftī, from Proto-Germanic haftiją.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

haft in the wild

  • The hilt (rarely called a haft or shaft) is the handle of a knife, dagger, sword, or bayonet, consisting of a guard, grip, and pommel.

    Hilt

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.