Definition of "wight"

O base Hungarian wight! wilt thou the spigot wield?

c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene iii]

Oh say me true if thou wert mortal wightAnd why from us so quickly thou didst take thy flight.

1626, John Milton, On the Death of a Fair Infant Dying of a Cough, verse vi

But woe betide the wandering wight, / That treads its circle in the night.

1808 February 22, Walter Scott, “Canto Third. The Hostel, or Inn.”, in Marmion; a Tale of Flodden Field, Edinburgh: […] J[ames] Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Company, […]; London: William Miller, and John Murray, stanza XXV, page 157

In this by-place of nature there abode, in a remote period of American history, that is to say, some thirty years since, a worthy wight of the name of Ichabod Crane, who sojourned, or, as he expressed it, "tarried," in Sleepy Hollow, for the purpose of instructing the children of the vicinity.

1820 March 5, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., number VI, New York, N.Y.: […] C. S. Van Winkle, […], page 57

Some gamesome wights will tell you that they have to plant weeds there, they don’t grow naturally; [...]

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 14, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, page 69

"Who is the miserable little wight?" he asked. He was told her name and dignity.

c. 1855, Charlotte Brontë, “Emma. (A Fragment of a Story by the Late Charlotte Brontë.)”, in The Cornhill Magazine, volume I, number 4, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], published April 1860, chapter I, page 491

"The man that hath no love of chess/Is truth to say a sorry wight."

c. 1872, a Knight's tour cryptotour poem, possibly by Howard Staunton, lines 1 and 2

[…] Alaeddin ate and drank and was cheered and after he had rested and had recovered spirits he cried, "Ah, O my mother, I have a sore grievance against thee for leaving me to that accursed wight who strave to compass my destruction and designed to take my life. Know that I beheld Death with mine own eyes at the hand of this damned wretch, whom thou didst certify to be my uncle; […]

1885, Richard F. Burton, The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 532

But I saw a glow-worm near, / Who replied: ‘What wailing wight / Calls the watchman of the night?

1789, William Blake, A Dream, lines 14–16

“In judging of that tempestuous wind called Euroclydon,” says an old writer—of whose works I possess the only copy extant—“it maketh a marvellous difference, whether thou lookest out at it from a glass window where the frost is all on the outside, or whether thou observest it from that sashless window, where the frost is on both sides, and of which the wight Death is the only glazier.”

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 2, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, page 10

Everything in their way was kicked out of place, the barrow-wight setting on with hideous eagerness; Grettir gave back before him for a long time, till at last it came to this, that he saw it would not do to hoard his strength any more; now neither spared the other, and they were brought to where the horse-bones were, and thereabout they wrestled long.

1869, William Morris, Eiríkr Magnússon, transl., Grettis Saga: The Story of Grettir the Strong, F. S. Ellis, page 49

I haue two sones that were but late made knyghtes / and the eldest hyghte sir Tirre / […] / and my yongest sone hyght Lauayne / and yf hit please yow / he shalle ryde with yow vnto that Iustes / and he is of his age x stronge and wyght(please add an English translation of this quotation)

1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter IX, in Le Morte Darthur, book XVIII

Then spake Much the milner son, / Ever more well him betide! / ‘Take twelve of thy wight yeomen, / Well weapon’d by thy side. / Such one would thyselfë slon, / That twelve dare not abide.’

a. 1450, “Robin Hood and the Monk”, in Frank Sidgwick, editor, Ballads of Robin Hood and other Outlaws, published 1912, page 98, lines 29–34

Ye do you to my father's stable, / Where steeds do stand baith wight and able; / Strike ane o' them upo' the back, / The swiftest will gie his head a wap.

a. 1828, “Leesome Brand”, in Peter Buchan, editor, Ancient Ballads and Songs of the North of Scotland, volume 1, published 1828, page 39, lines 21–24