rote

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“
Romola spoke partly by rote, as all ardent and sympathetic young creatures do; but she spoke with intense belief.

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Definitions (22)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. noun A memorizing process using routine or repetition, often without full attention or comprehension: learn by rote.
  2. noun Mechanical routine.
  3. noun The sound of surf breaking on the shore.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (11)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (6)

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Examples (50)

  • I thrust on one side all the ordinary school-learning which I utterly failed to appropriate in its customary disconnected state (it was meant only to be learned by rote, and this I never could recognise as the exclusive condition of a really comprehensive culture of the human mind), and I went up in the middle of my eighteenth year to the University of Jena. —  Autobiography of Friedrich Froebel
  • I found that they knew nothing perfectly: certain things they had learned by rote, and could recite with some exactitude, but of the reasons and principles that underlie all real knowledge they knew nothing. —  The Quest of the Simple Life
  • The secret of long-term professional success is to refuse to do anything by rote, and insist upon having a logical reason for every step one takes. —  RenewAmerica
  • They make every 2-0 look so rote, as if they're just calmly conjugating verbs while the other team is trying to repair the hull of a spaceship. —  Soccer Blogs - latest posts
  • It's done very much by rote, and it's hard to get excited about it. —  Comics Should Be Good! @ Comic Book Resources
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This word has been looked up 106 times.

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Etymologies (8)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. Middle English.
  2. Probably of Scandinavian origin; akin to Old Norse rauta, to roar.
  3. Middle English, from Old French, probably of Germanic origin.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (5)

  1. from Middle English rot, root, rote, from Old French rote, route, roupte, a way through a forest, a way, road, track, rut, French route, a way, road, track, = Spanish ruta = Portuguese rota, track, course of a ship at sea (Middle Latin reflex rotta, rota), from Middle Latin rupta, a way through a forest, a way, road, street; prop, adjective, sc. via, a way broken or cut through a forest; from Latin rupta, feminine of ruptus, past participle of rumpere, break: see rupture. Rote is thus a doublet of route, rout, rut, q. v. Cf. routine.
  2. from rote, n. Cf. rote.
  3. from Latin rotare, whirl, rotate: see rotate.
  4. from Middle English rote, roote, from Old French rote (= Provencal Old Spanish rota) = Old High German hrottā, rottā, rotā, roddā, Middle High German rotte, from Middle Latin rotta, rota, rocta, earlier chrotta, a kind of fiddle, a crowd; of Celtic origin: from Welsh crwth = Old Irish crot = Gaelic cruit, a fiddle, crowd: see crowd.
  5. A dial. variant of rout or rut.
 

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/roʊt/
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