welter
1 Americanverb (used without object)
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welters,
present (3rd person singular)
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weltered,
past participle, past
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weltering
present participle
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to roll, toss, or heave, as waves or the sea.
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to roll, writhe, or tumble about; wallow, as animals (often followed byabout ).
pigs weltering about happily in the mud.
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to lie bathed in or be drenched in something, especially blood.
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to become deeply or extensively involved, associated, entangled, etc..
to welter in setbacks, confusion, and despair.
noun
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a confused mass; a jumble or muddle.
a welter of anxious faces.
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a state of commotion, turmoil, or upheaval.
the welter that followed the surprise attack.
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a rolling, tossing, or tumbling about, as or as if by the sea, waves, or wind.
They found the shore through the mighty welter.
noun
adjective
verb
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to roll about, writhe, or wallow
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(esp of the sea) to surge, heave, or toss
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to lie drenched in a liquid, esp blood
noun
-
a rolling motion, as of the sea
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a confused mass; jumble
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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weltersimple
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welterssimple
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have welteredperfect
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has welteredperfect
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am welteringprogressive
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are welteringprogressive
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is welteringprogressive
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have been welteringperfect progressive
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has been welteringperfect progressive
Past
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welteredsimple
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had welteredperfect
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was welteringprogressive
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were welteringprogressive
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had been welteringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of welter1
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English welteren, welten “tumble, fall over; writhe,” Old English wiltan, weltan “roll”; cognate with Middle Dutch welteren, Low German weltern “to roll”
Origin of welter2
First recorded in 1785–95; of uncertain origin; perhaps from welt in the sense “to beat soundly” + -er 1, or welter 1 in the sense “a rolling or tossing about”
Explanation
Use the noun welter to describe an enormous, messy pile, like the jumble of papers, coffee mugs, pens, and food wrappers on the desk of the messiest person in the office. Welter can also be a verb — the items in the pile on the messy desk welter every time someone tries to pull something out. This means they roll and get tossed around. Maybe the person isn't as messy as you think. Possibly his projects keep him so weltered — meaning "deeply involved" — that he doesn't have the time or energy to deal with the mess.
Vocabulary lists containing welter
Fahrenheit 451
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A Long Walk to Water
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Oedipus the King
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
This is the view from downstream, looking up at the house and its welter of projecting terraces.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 28, 2026
Within the government here in the UK, there is a quiet pride that Britain made its contribution to the welter of diplomacy European neighbours and others have been doing in recent days.
From BBC ● Jan. 21, 2026
But the 2014 YouTube video set off a welter of “fire noodle challenges” around the world, launching Buldak into viral fame.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 5, 2024
Among a welter of preliminary deals was an actual contract between Seoul’s state-run Korea National Oil Corp. and Saudi Arabia’s state-run energy giant Saudi Aramco.
From Washington Times ● Oct. 26, 2023
The vast vapours that arose in Mordor and went streaming westward passed low overhead, a great welter of cloud and smoke now lit again beneath with a sullen glow of red.
From "The Return of the King" by J.R.R. Tolkien
Intimations of jazz, Balinese gamelan, African drumming and Japanese music floated from welters of rapid passagework.
From New York Times ● Jan. 8, 2010
Carole Bolsey’s paintings are welters of vivid hues from which recognizable forms — boats, a horse — emerge.
From Washington Post
I should rather believe," said the priest, "that, with all the obvious disadvantages of organisation, left to itself, the stream welters into a shapeless marsh, instead of making glad the City of God!
From Beside Still Waters by Arthur Christopher Benson
Jormungand welters In giant rage And smites the waves.
From The Younger Edda Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda by Rasmus Björn Anderson
He has no imagination at all—or, what is the same thing, an imagination which welters in impotence, far below the level of the emotions which it ought to overrule.
From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 by Various
One year ago, on "the tenth day of the tenth month," there was a relatively stable northern Government at Peking, and the southern Government at Canton weltered in the doldrums of impotence.
From Time Magazine Archive
With each successive year since the fall of the Empire, China has weltered ever deeper in the morass of civil war.
From Time Magazine Archive
For 48 hours the West weltered in the confusion of factlessness: the air waves and the news columns were splashed with words like "purge" and "shake-up."
From Time Magazine Archive
I was impeded by the water, which already reached to my thighs; but with desperate energy I plunged and weltered through it, till I had gained a point of safety.
From The Scalp Hunters by F.A. Stewart
He rolled and he weltered and wallowed — You'd kick your hat faster, I'll bet; They finished all bunched, and he followed All lathered and dripping with sweat.
From The Man from Snowy River by A. B. (Andrew Barton) Paterson
The echo, here, is of “Citizen Kane,” where the camera cranes over a rooftop and down through a skylight, in a weltering storm.
From The New Yorker ● Oct. 19, 2015
Some people ride out their lives weltering in a vivid spiritual experience regarding which they scarcely ever speak.
From Slate ● Sep. 11, 2015
Wife At Nantasket Beach, Mass., a bather thought he saw his wife weltering in the surf, frantically summoned lifeguards, who plunged in, rescued a beer keg.
From Time Magazine Archive
Spain was weltering last week in a revolution which experts had to certify as absolutely Grade A. Its authentic qualities of mass upheaval reduced to secondary stature both the government leaders and the revolutionary generals.
From Time Magazine Archive
Welter, wel′tėr, v.i. to roll or tumble about, to wallow about, esp. in dirt: to lie in some floating substance.—v.t. to make way in a weltering manner.—n. a tossing about, a state of turmoil.—adj.
From Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary (part 4 of 4: S-Z and supplements) by Various
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