wild [OE] Both wild and wilderness are Old English words. The first sense of wild was ‘not tame or domesticated’, and wilderness means literally ‘land inhabited only by wild animals’—it comes from Old English wild dēor ‘wild deer’. This is the sense in The Call of the Wild (1903), a novella by the American writer Jack London about a pet sold as a sled dog that returns to the wild to lead a pack of wolves. To the Anglo-Saxons wildfire was originally a raging, destructive fire caused by a lightning strike. It was also a mixture of highly flammable substances used in warfare, and a term for various skin diseases that spread quickly over the body. wild goose chase does not come from hunting. Early examples, dating from the late 16th century, refer to a popular sport of the time in which each of a line of riders had to follow accurately the course of the leader, like a flight of wild geese. The wooded uplands know as wolds [OE], as in Cotswolds, or wealds [OE] are probably from the same root. See also deer, voice, west, wool.