324: loath and loathe Oct 28, 2015

There are a number of words that are so similar in sound that people often confuse them; in the case of 'loath' and 'loathe', the confusion is even greater. 'Loathe' is a verb, and means to "feel intense disdain for", while 'loath' is an adjective, meaning "reluctant or unwilling". The difference in spelling has always been slight, the adjective coming from the Old English, 'lāth' and the verb coming from its verbal derivative, 'lāthen'.