Etymologically
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almighty

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Pronunciation

  • /ɔːlˈmaɪti/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English almighti,[2][3] inherited from Old English ælmihtig, also ealmihtig,[4][5][6] formed from æl- (“all”), a combining form related to eall (“all”), and mihtig (“mighty”), from miht (“might”).[3][5][4] The word is common to the Germanic languages:[7] compare Old Frisian ellemachtich, Old Saxon alomahtig, Old High German alamahtīg (now allmächtig), Old Dutch alamahtig, Middle Dutch almachtich (now almachtig) and Old Norse almáttigr.[8][9][10][6] The OED, Barnhart, Hoad and Weekley take these words as loan translations of Latin omnipotēns (“all-powerful”), the source of omnipotent;[8][6][10][11] Etymonline thinks this only possible.[7] According to the OED, the first element was originally the Germanic combining form of all, later replaced by forms of the adverb.[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

All-powerful, as a title of God: the word is found in Old English from the earliest texts, in the Vespasian Psalter and in Beowulf,[8][6] where se Ælmihtiga, the Almighty, already stands for God.[12][8]

Semantic evolution

In Old English the word was used only of God or other deities,[7][8] and Weekley notes that it was applied to God from the 9th century as a rendering of the Latin omnipotens.[11] The general sense "having great power", of people and things, appears by the late 14th century, first in Chaucer's Monk's Tale;[7][8] Chaucer used the word 25 times and Gower 9 times.[13] A 15th-century text rendered Latin omnipotencia as allmyghtyhede, "almightihood".[7] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as "of unlimited power; omnipotent".[14] In 1836 Washington Irving wrote of "the almighty dollar", money as the object of universal devotion, and the phrase became current, chiefly in the United States.[7][8][15] From the 1820s, first in North America, the adjective was also an intensifier, "very great, enormous" (1824),[8][16] and in 1830 it became an adverb, "very, extremely", as in almighty cold.[8][5][16]

Timeline

  • Old English – adjective, all-powerful, of God; also the Almighty, God (Beowulf).[8][6]
  • c. 1405 – of people or things, having great power or authority (Chaucer).[8]
  • 1824 – colloquial, very great, enormous.[8][16]
  • 1830 – adverb, very, extremely.[8][5]
  • 1836 – the almighty dollar (Washington Irving).[8][7]

Modern meaning

Adjective

  1. Having unlimited power; omnipotent, used especially of God.
  2. Having very great power or influence: the almighty dollar.
  3. (informal) Very great; used as an intensifier: They had an almighty quarrel over the bill.

Noun

  1. the Almighty: God.

Adverb

  1. (informal) Extremely, very: It was almighty hot in the attic.

Word family

  • almightily
  • almightiness
  • almighty dollar

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  4. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  5. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  10. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  12. ^ Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  13. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
  14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  15. ^ The Chambers Dictionary (2008), 11th ed., Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap
  16. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com