English dictionary, thesaurus, translations & etymology

Etymology — The origins of English words

Where do words come from? Trace the origin and history of any English word, from its Latin, Greek or Old English roots through to its modern meaning. Every etymology is sourced.

Browse etymology by letter

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

Recently added

Built from tele- ("distant") and -pathy ("feeling"), literally "feeling at a distance."

Borrowed from French telegraphe, from "tele-" ("far") plus "-graph" ("writing"), coined as a name for Claude Chappe's semaphore network.

Borrowed via Portuguese teca from a South Indian (Malayalam/Tamil) word for the tree.

From taste plus the adjective suffix -y.

From Old English teart, meaning sharp or severe, going back to a Germanic root related to "tear."

From Old English tannere, built on the verb tan plus the agent suffix -er.

Imitative in origin, originally describing a sharp ringing sound before extending to sharp tastes and smells.

Uncertain; compare obsolete French tamise (but if there was borrowing, it is unclear in which direction).

From tame + the agent suffix -er.

A shortened form of "tallyho," though the counting sense comes from an older tradition of recording numbers with notches on a stick.

From Old French teint ("dyed, tinged"), from Latin tingere — the same root that gives us "tint."

From French tact, itself from Latin tactus, "touch" — the idea of a sensitive, careful "touch" in dealing with people.

From French tabis, ultimately from Arabic al-attabiyya, a district of Baghdad known for producing a type of striped watered silk; the pattern name later transferred to cats with similar markings.

From Middle English syne, a shortened form of "sithen," meaning "since."

From earlier English "shrick," related to Scandinavian words like Swedish skrika, ultimately imitative of the sound itself.

From Old English scealu ("shell, husk"), related to "shell" and a doublet of "scale".

"Shag" plus the adjective-forming ending "-y".

From "shade" plus "-y".

From Old French reclus, from Latin recludere, which oddly originally meant "to open" — the sense flipped over time to mean someone shut away from the world.

From Old French marbre, from Latin marmor, from Greek mármaros — possibly related to a Greek word meaning "gleaming."

From Old English lustfull ("desirous"), from lust + -ful.

From Latin lascivus, meaning "playful" or "wanton," which took on a more sexual overtone over time.

From Old French vil, from Latin vilis, originally meaning "cheap" or "of low value" before it took on the sense of moral worthlessness.

From Old English laewede ("unlearned, lay, not a member of the clergy"). The word originally just meant "uneducated" or "common," and drifted over centuries toward its modern sense of crude and sexually indecent.