Also wudz. [app. orig. misprint for wook, repr. Canarese ukku (pronounced with initial w) steel.] A crucible steel made in southern India by fusing magnetic iron ore with carbonaceous matter. Also attrib. and Comb.
1795. Phil. Trans., LXXXV. 322. Doctor Scott … has sent over specimens of a substance known by the name of wootz; which is considered to be a kind of steel.
1824. Encycl. Brit., Suppl. III. 456/2. Wootz, a steel from India, has lately been most successfully employed [for cutlery].
1839. Ure, Dict. Arts, 1176. The wootz ore consists of the magnetic oxide of iron, united with quartz.
1869. J. D. Baldwin, Preh. Nations, vi. (1877), 229. The celebrated India steel called wudz.
1881. Blackw. Mag. May, 568–9. In the Indian ‘wootz’ steel, for instance, which possesses remarkable toughness and sharpness, he fancied he found aluminium.
