waarts

Waarts is a Dutch adverb meaning toward, in the direction of, and is used to indicate movement or orientation toward a place or direction. It is predominantly found in historical texts, nautical language, and poetry, and is rarely used in everyday speech today.

Etymology: Waarts derives from Middle Dutch waerts, related to German weit/wärts and to the English suffix -ward as in westward. The word preserves older Germanic forms, and its modern descendants appear in various directional compounds as well as in fixed literary expressions. Contemporary Dutch often replaces waarts with naar, richting, or with compound forms such as noordwaarts or zuidwaarts.

Usage and forms: In modern Dutch, waarts survives mainly as part of directional compounds ending in -waarts (noordwaarts, zuidwaarts, oostwaarts, westwaarts) and in certain archaic or formal phrases. It can appear as an independent adverb in older or ceremonial prose, or in nautical language to describe a vessel’s course. In everyday prose, speakers typically use naar combined with a compass point or a phrase like in de richting van.

Examples: De schepen voeren noordwaarts. De wind draaide waarts richting het zuiden. In poetry, waarts can appear to evoke a classical or elevated tone.

See also: Noordwaarts, zuidwaarts, oostwaarts, westwaarts; Germanwärts/wärts as related directional forms; English -ward as a cross-language comparison for direction words.