ETYMOLOGY
from night + worm
EXAMPLE (for n. 1.)
“… Ye noble Pryncis, conceyueth the sentence
Off this story, remembrid in scripture,
How that Sampson off wilful necligence
Was shaue & shorn, diffacid his figure;
Keep your conceitis vnder couerture,
Suffre no nyhtwerm withynne your counsail kreepe,
Thouh Dalida compleyne, crie and weepe!…”
From: The Fall of Princes
Translated by John Lydgate, a1439
Edited by Dr. Henry Bergen
The Early English Text Society, 1924
Lexicophilia 