Etymology

The study of the origin and historical development of words, establishing where words come from and how their forms and meanings have changed.

Definition

Etymology is the study of the origin and historical development of words, including changes in their form and meaning and the identification of their earliest recoverable sources.

Scope

This topic covers etymology as a scholarly discipline: the methods for tracing a word's history through sound change, semantic change, borrowing, and word formation; the use of attestations and regular correspondences as evidence; the structure of etymological dictionaries; and the distinction between scientific etymology and popular folk etymology.

Core questions

• How is the origin of a word established and tested?
• What evidence supports or refutes a proposed etymology?
• How do sound change, semantic change, and borrowing figure in word histories?
• What distinguishes scientific etymology from folk etymology?
• How are etymological dictionaries compiled and used?

Key theories

Evidence-based etymology

Durkin sets out how sound etymologies are established by combining the documented history of a word with regular sound correspondences and known processes of semantic change, rather than by surface resemblance alone.

History

Etymology as practiced today emerged once the regularity of sound change provided an objective test for proposed origins, displacing the speculative etymologies of earlier eras. Major etymological dictionaries, such as Skeat's for English and Kluge's for German, embodied the new rigor, and the Oxford English Dictionary established etymology on documentary historical principles.

Debates

Limits of etymological certainty

Many words have uncertain or disputed etymologies because the documentary record is incomplete or because several plausible sources are consistent with the evidence, so etymologies vary in their degree of confidence.

Key figures

• Philip Durkin
• Walter William Skeat
• Friedrich Kluge

Seminal works

• durkin2009

Frequently asked questions

Why do dictionaries sometimes say a word's origin is unknown?

When the documentary evidence is insufficient and no proposed source meets the standards of regular sound correspondence and attested history, responsible etymologists label the origin uncertain rather than guess.

Is the original meaning of a word its 'true' meaning?

No. The etymological meaning shows a word's history but does not determine its correct current use; the etymological fallacy is the mistaken belief that a word should mean what it once meant.