etymology

From Middle English ethymologie, from Old French ethimologie, from Latin etymologia, from Ancient Greek ἐτυμολογία (etumología), from ἔτυμον (étumon, “true sense”) and -λογία (-logía, “study or logic of”), from λόγος (lógos, “word; explanation”).

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: ĕt'ĭ-mŏlʹə-jē; IPA^(key): /ˌɛtɪˈmɒləd͡ʒi/
• (Canada) enPR: ĕt'ə-mŏʹlə-jē; IPA^(key): /ˌɛtəˈmɒləd͡ʒi/, [ˌɛɾəˈmɒləd͡ʒi]
• (General American) enPR: ĕt'ə-mŏʹlə-jē; IPA^(key): /ˌɛtəˈmɑləd͡ʒi/, [ˌɛɾəˈmɑləd͡ʒi]

  • Audio (US):

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• (General Australian, New Zealand) enPR: ĕt'ə-mŏlʹə-jē; IPA^(key): /ˌetəˈmɔləd͡ʒi/, [ˌeɾəˈmɔləd͡ʒi]
• (India) enPR: ĕt'ĭ-mŏlʹə-jē; IPA^(key): /ˌetɪˈmɒləd͡ʒi/, [ˌeʈɪˈmɔləd͡ʒi], [ˌeʈɪˈmaləd͡ʒi]
• (General South African) enPR: ĕt'ə-mŏlʹə-jē; IPA^(key): /ˌetəˈmɑləd͡ʒi/, [ˌetɘˈmɑləd͡ʒi]
• Hyphenation: e‧ty‧mo‧lo‧gy
• Rhymes: -ɒlədʒi

etymology (countable and uncountable, plural etymologies)

2. (uncountable, linguistics) The scientific study of the origin and evolution of a word's semantic meaning across time, including its constituent morphemes and phonemes.

   Holonyms: historical linguistics < linguistics

4. (countable) The entire catalogue of meanings that a word, morpheme, or sign has carried throughout its history.

   Although written the same, the words lead (the metal) and lead (the verb) have totally different etymologies.

   • 2018, James Lambert, “A multitude of ‘lishes’: The nomenclature of hybridity”, in English World-Wide‎^[1], page 13:

     The etymology of the term Japlish is disputed and contentiously so.

6. (countable) An account of the origin and historical development of a word as presented in a dictionary or the like.

   Synonym: derivation

   • 2011 [2009], Philip Durkin, “About this book”, in The Oxford Guide to Etymology, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page ix:

     Etymologies appeal to people with a very wide variety of interests and intellectual backgrounds. A very few people, such as myself, spend most of their time researching etymologies. A slightly larger number do so very occasionally. Many, many more people look at etymologies, but have never researched any themselves. Some people will never even have thought of etymologies as things which need to be researched. Particularly when etymologies are encountered in the compressed form found in many dictionaries, they can seem to be a given, rather than the (often very tentative) results of extensive research. This book is intended for anyone who has taken the important first step of realizing that etymologies are the result of research, and would like to discover something about the nature of that research, and the principles and methodologies which underlie it.

   • 2012 August 13, Leslie Larson, “Up a family tree”, in CNN‎^[2]:

     I began to study coats of arms, visit the Web sites of portrait galleries and look up the etymology of Gaelic names.

   • 2023 July 2, Talia Felix, “Homing in on Harlequin”, in Online Etymology Dictionary‎^[3]:

     Where did this name Harlequin (or Arlechin) come from? Most etymologies for the name give the Hellequin theory.

7. (countable) The direct origin of a name, as in who someone was named after.
   • 1996, The Rock:

     I'm sure you know the etymology of your name, Goodspeed.

• Not to be confused with entomology (“the study of insects”) or etiology (“the study of causes or origins”).
• Not to be confused with the origin of the object or person to which the word refers.

• “etymology”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin, 2000, →ISBN.
• “etymology”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
• "etymology" in WordNet 2.0, Princeton University, 2003.