Brewer's: Rote

To learn by rote is to learn by turning words round and round in the memory as a wheel. To “learn by heart” is to learn thoroughly (French, apprendre par caeur). Shakespeare speaks of the “heart of loss,” meaning entire loss, and to love with “all our heart” is to love thoroughly. (Latin, rota, a wheel.)

“Take hackney'd jokes from Miller got by rote.”

Byron: English Bards, etc.

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