virgate
/vɜɹˈɡeɪt/noun, adjective
virgate is a noun meaning “The yardland: an obsolete English land measure usually comprising ¹⁄₄ of a hide and notionally equal to 30 acres” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled V-I-R-G-A-T-E and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 58 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of virgate is virgates.
What does virgate mean?
noun
- 1
The yardland: an obsolete English land measure usually comprising ¹⁄₄ of a hide and notionally equal to 30 acres.
adjective
- 1
Rod-shaped: straight, long, and thin, (particularly botany) the habitus of plants with straight, erect branches.
- 2
Finely striped, often with dark fibers.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce virgate?
- US /vɜɹˈɡeɪt/
- US /ˈvɝɡət/
- UK /ˈvɜːɡət/
As an adjective (“Rod-shaped: straight, long, and thin, (particularly botany)…”): /ˈvɝɡət/, /ˈvɜːɡət/.
Virgate has 2 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-virgate.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of virgate
- virgates plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is virgate?
Virgate appears about once in every 58 million words in written English, the 237,177th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Where does virgate come from?
Borrowed from Latin virgāta, "yard" compared to "virga" as a measuring rod. Doublet of vergée.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).