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.

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From Old French giste, feminine of gist, the past participle of gesir (“to lie down”).

A rare spelling variant of Carly.

From king + bolt.

From Latin incredibilitas, equivalent to incredible + -ity.

From invalid + -ness.

From infantry + man.

Unknown; speculatively, influence may flow (in some direction) among the following words: jackass, ninny, jackanapes, pickaninny.

From infamy + -ize.

Latin insultatio, from insulto: compare Old French insultation.

Borrowed from Japanese 神社 (じんじゃ, jinja), from Middle Chinese 神社, from Old Chinese 神社 (“sacrificial altar, shrine”), from 神 (*hlin, “deity, divine”) + 社 (*ɦljaːʔ, “Earth deity [and altar]”). Cognate with Mandarin 神社 (shénshè, “shrine”).

From incest + -ual.

From in- + complex.

From indefatigable + -ly, but indefatigable itself was attested later. In use since the 16th century.

From Middle English inflowen, equivalent to in- + flow.

From Mandarin 開平 /开平 (Kāipíng).

From intense + -en.

From justice + -er.

From in- + utterable.

From kind + -some.

From in- + judicial.

Borrowed from Middle French indolence, or from its etymon Latin indolentia (“freedom from pain; insensibility”), from in- (prefix meaning ‘not’) + dolēns (“hurting, suffering; grieving, lamenting”) + -ia (suffix forming feminine abstract nouns). Dolēns is the present participle of doleō (“to hurt, suffer; to be sorry, deplore, grieve for, lament”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *delh₁- (“to divide, split”).

From iso- + -tropy.

From Middle French inéluctable (whence in- + e- and -able), from Latin inēlūctābilis, from in- + ēlūctor (“struggle out”) + -bilis.