The Old English word creodan, meaning to press together, is the source of the word crowd (a throng of people pressing together) and also of curd (lumps of coagulated milk that may be made into cheese). When the word first appeared in English in the middle of the fourteenth century it was spelt and pronounced as crud; however, by the fifteenth century the r and the u sounds had traded places—a process known as metathesis—thus giving rise to curd, which in turn developed the verb form curdle. About fifty years ago, however, the word crud—meaning lumps of disgusting, foreign matter—suddenly reappeared in English, either as the result of a reverse metathesis of curd or as the result of someone intentionally resurrecting the original, defunct form of the word.
The coagulum of milk from which cheese can be made.
Milk coagulum, composed mainly of casein.
A pliable and malleable entity, shaped by the action of curdling or coagulating, frequently found in milk.