Exact historical dictionary sense

Letter in Webster's 1913 dictionary

The 1913 record labels letter as noun. Its source-bounded etymology and selected historical definition appear below.

WEBSTER 1913noun

Letter

[From Let to hinder.]

Cross-verified historical sense

The source text may be outdated. The page preserves that historical boundary.

Cross-verified 1913 record

Headwordletter

Part of speechnoun

Historical etymology[From Let to hinder.]

Selected historical definitionOne who retards or hinders.

Signed record IDwebster1913-letter-noun-83ab175b9d38

Source locatorCIDE.L, paragraph 3227; Gutenberg eBook 664

Edition-scoped answerNot earliest-attestation proofNot modern consensus

Independent historical textProject Gutenberg section 664 Signed structural record sourceGNU GCIDE 0.54 archive

Quick answer

In Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913), "letter" is labeled noun. Its etymology is recorded as: "[From Let to hinder.]" The selected historical definition says: "One who retards or hinders."

Project Gutenberg Webster 1913 plus signed GNU GCIDE 0.54 Exact cross-verified historical record reviewed 2026-10-04

What this answer proves

One named sense in one historical dictionary edition.

The answer reports the selected headword, part of speech, etymology, definition, and source locator as transcribed in the cross-verified 1913 record.

Evidence boundaryIt does not establish the earliest attestation or a complete borrowing chain.It does not claim current scholarly consensus or a modern dictionary definition.Historical dictionary text may be obsolete, incomplete, inaccurate, or offensive by modern standards.

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adjective

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Letter in Webster's 1913 dictionary

One named sense in one historical dictionary edition.

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