October

• Octobre (obsolete)

From Middle English, borrowed from Old French octobre, from Latin Octōber (“eighth month”), from Latin octō (“eight”), from Proto-Indo-European *oḱtṓw (“twice four”); + Latin -ber, from -bris, an adjectival suffix; October was the eighth month in the Roman calendar.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɒkˈtəʊ.bə/
• IPA^(key): /ɑkˈtoʊb.əɹ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊbə(ɹ)
• Hyphenation: Oc‧to‧ber

October (plural Octobers)

2. The tenth month of the Gregorian calendar, following September and preceding November.

   Alternative forms: Oct, Oct., OCT, 10

   Holonyms: calendar year; year

   Comeronyms: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, November, December

   • 2025 July 18, Timothy McLaughlin, “A Rebel Army Is Building a Rare-Earth Empire on China's Border. The Kachin Independence Organization fought for decades in obscurity. Now it's supplying essential minerals to manufacturers around the world”, in Bloomberg Businessweek‎^[1], archived from the original on 18 July 2025:

     By October it was advancing steadily toward Pangwa, encountering meager resistance.

3. (rare) A female given name transferred from the month name.
   • 2002 January, Cincinnati Magazine, volume 35, number 4, page 138:

     The other one [book] I just read is October Suite by Maxine Clair (Random House, $23.95). It's about a woman named October. She's a young black schoolteacher in the 1950s ...

   • 2009, C.S. Graham, The Archangel Project, →ISBN, page 31:

     From somewhere in the distance came the screaming whine of an emergency vehicle's siren. Lance flipped open his phone. “Get me the address of a woman named October Guinness . . . That's right, October,” he said again, [...]

October (uncountable)

1. (now historical) A type of ale traditionally brewed in October. [from 18th c.]
   • 1751, [Tobias] Smollett, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), London: Harrison and Co., […], →OCLC:

     [T]he gate of a large chateau, of a most noble and venerable appearance […] induced them to alight and view the apartments, contrary to their first intention of drinking a glass of his October at the door.

   • 1898, Stanley John Weyman, “III. Tutor and Pupils”, in The Castle Inn:

     Sir George, borne along in his chair, peered up at this well-known window--well-known, since in the Oxford of 1767 a man's rooms were furnished if he had tables and chairs, store of beef and October, an apple-pie and Common Room port--and seeing the casement brilliantly lighted, smiled a trifle contemptuously.

October (third-person singular simple present Octobers, present participle Octobering, simple past and past participle Octobered)

1. (historical, transitive) In the early Soviet Union, to give a child a name tinged with Soviet revolutionary thought, as opposed to religious christening.

• Octobre

By analogy with September, as if from octō and a suffix -ber. In the Roman calendar, the year began with Mārtius (“March”), and Octōber was the eighth month of the year.

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ɔkˈtoː.bɛr]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [okˈt̪ɔː.ber]

Octōber (feminine Octōbris, neuter Octōbre); third-declension three-termination adjective

1. of October
   • 1st century CE — Lucius Iunius Moderatus Columella, De Re Rustica, Book XII

     Cum eius radicem mense Octobri, quo[d] maxime matura est.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

   • 2023, Pope Francis, Est utique fiducia:

     Datum Romae, Laterani, die XV mensis Octobris, in memoria sanctae Teresiae a Iesu, anno MMXXIII, Pontificatus Nostri undecimo

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

In Classical Latin, month names were regularly used as adjectives, generally modifying a case-form of mēnsis m sg (“month”) or of one of the nouns used in the Roman calendar to refer to specific days of the month from which other days were counted: Calendae f pl (“calends”), Nōnae f pl (“nones”), Īdūs f pl (“ides”). However, the masculine noun mēnsis could be omitted by ellipsis, so the masculine singular forms of month names eventually came to be used as proper nouns.^[1]

The accusative plural adjective forms Aprīlīs, Septembrīs, Octōbrīs, Novembrīs, Decembrīs^[2] are ambiguous in writing, being spelled identically to the genitive singular forms of the nouns; nevertheless, the use of ablative singular forms in -ī and comparison with the usage of other month names as adjectives supports the interpretation of -is as an accusative plural adjective ending in Classical Latin phrases such as "kalendas Septembris".^[3]

Third-declension three-termination adjective.

• In medieval and New Latin, the ablative singular can also be found as Octōbre.

Octōber m sg (genitive Octōbris); third declension

1. October

Third-declension noun (i-stem, ablative singular in -ī), singular only.

• In medieval and New Latin, the ablative singular can also be found as Octōbre.

Borrowings

Unsorted borrowings

These borrowings are ultimately but perhaps not directly from Latin. They are organized into geographical and language family groups, not by etymology.

• Roman calendar on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• “October”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper’s Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers

From Latin Octōber (“of the eighth month”).

• IPA^(key): [okˈtobər]

October

1. October

• Previous: September. Next: November