werra

• guerra (11th c.)
• wera

Borrowed from Frankish *werru (“riot, quarrel”). First attested in 858 CE.^[1]

werra f (genitive werrae); first declension (Early Medieval Latin)

1. war

   Synonym: bellum (Classical)

   • 13th century, Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, a. 1216:

     Ad hoc nuntii responderunt, quod rex Angliae ante crucem sumptam werram moverat domino Lodowico et damna multa fecerat, castra sua ceperat et adhuc milites suos et servientes incarceratos retinet, et hucusque in werra est contra dominum Lodowicum, nec pacem vel treugam cum eo habere voluit, super hoc etiam saepe requisitus.

     To this the nuncios replied that the king of England had made war on lord Louis before taking the cross, and had done much harm, had seized his castles and still retained his subject prisoners and soldiers, and was yet at war against lord Louis, and did not desire to make either peace or truce with him, even as he was frequently requested to do so.

   • 1294, “Convenzione tra il Comune di Sassari, e il Comune di Genova”, in Codex diplomaticus Sardiniae, volume 1, page 519:

     […] comune et homines de Sassari et districtu, quem nunc habet et in posterum acquisiverit, faciet et facient pacem, guerram et treugam cum omnibus personis, universitatibus, locis, regibus, principibus, atque dominis, ubicumque sint et quocumque nomine censeantur, cum quibus comune Ianue pacem, guerram vel treugam habet […]

     […] the commune and people of Sassari and of the territory that it has now and will have acquired in future, make peace, war and truce with all persons, corporations, places, kings, princes, and lords, wherever they may be and by whatever name they are called, with which the commune of Genoa has made peace, war or truce […]

2. strife, insurrection

First-declension noun.

• guerra recrēdūta

• Italo-Romance:
  • Corsican: guèrra
  • Italian: guerra
  • Neapolitan: uerra
  • Sicilian: guerra, verra, uerra
    • → Maltese: gwerra
• North Italian:
  • Friulian: vuere
  • Istriot: guiera
  • Ladin: viera
  • Ligurian: goæra
  • Piedmontese: guèra
  • Romansch: uiara, veara
  • Venetan: guera
• Gallo-Romance:
  • Catalan: guerra
  • Occitan: guèrra
  • Old French: guerre, guere, gere, gerre, were, wiere, werre
    • Bourguignon: guârre, gârre, gârre
    • Middle French: guerre (see there for further descendants)
    • Norman: gùerre, dgèrre (Jersey), djère, guère (Guernsey), gyer (Sark)
    • Picard: guère, dgère (Nord and Pas-de-Calais), djérre (Somme and Oise)
    • Walloon: guere, guêre, guére, guère
    • → Old English: werre, wyrre
      • Middle English: werre, ware, wær, weer, weorre, wer, were, werr, weyr, worre
        • English: war
        • Scots: wer, weir, war
• Ibero-Romance:
  • Old Leonese: [Term?]
    • Asturian: guerra
    • Leonese: gerra
  • Old Galician-Portuguese: guerra
    • Fala: guerra
    • Galician: guerra
    • Portuguese: guerra
  • Old Spanish: guerra
    • Ladino: gerra
    • Spanish: guerra
    • → Basque: gerra
    • → Moroccan Arabic: قِرَّة (gīrra)
• Vulgar Latin: *werrizāre (see there for further descendants)

• werra in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• R. E. Latham, D. R. Howlett, & R. K. Ashdowne, editors (1975–2013), “werra”, in Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources‎^[1], London: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, →ISBN, →OCLC

werra

1. no good
   • Papers of Daisy Bates, National Library of Australia, MS 365, Section XII, Language: Grammar And Vocabularies, Part 2. B. 3. (a), Southwestern District, Jakbum & Wabbinyet of Albany:

     alle werra (that is no good)

• 1839, George Grey, Vocabulary of the Aboriginal Language of Western Australia (Perth gazette and Western Australian journal)
• 1914, A few notes on some South-Western Australian dialects, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 44, pp. 65–82

From Proto-West Germanic *werru (“confusion; quarrel”).

werra f

1. trouble

• Middle High German: wërre
  • German: Wirre
• ⇒ Old High German: werran
  • Middle High German: werren, wirren
    • German: wirren
  • ⇒ Old High German: giwerri
    • Middle High German: gewërre
      • German: Gewirre, Gewirr
• ⇒ Old High German: werrisal
  • Middle High German: *werrsal, *wirrsal
    • German: Wirrsal

From Proto-West Germanic *werru (“confusion; quarrel”).

werra f

1. trouble

• Middle Low German: werre