annotate

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin annotō (“to note in writing, mark”), also adnotō, taken from its past participial stem with the suffix -ate,^[2][3][4][5] from ad- (“to”) and notō (“to mark, note”), from nota (“mark, sign”).^[6][2][7][4] The noun has traditionally been connected with nōscō (“to come to know”), and the American Heritage Dictionary still refers it to Proto-Indo-European *gnō-, but Etymonline reports de Vaan's view that this is impossible.^[4][6] English had earlier annote, recorded from 1449 and probably from the same Latin verb,^[2] and Weekley took the present form as elaborated from it.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

To make a mark on something: a surgical translation of 1598, from Guillemeau's Frenche Chirurgerye, speaks of "the skinne beinge annotated" over a vein.^[2][3] The OED revised the word in 2022 with these dates; older dictionaries begin later, Merriam-Webster Unabridged in 1710,^[9] Dictionary.com Unabridged in 1725–35^[10] and Etymonline in 1733.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The first two uses, "to mark" and "to denote" (1609), soon died out.^[2] The modern sense, adding explanatory notes to a text, is recorded from 1693 in W. Kennett's life of W. Somner,^[2] but it was already present in annote, from about 1525, and in the noun annotation, a note, from 1528.^[2] Weekley thought the verb first occurred in Johnson, as a gloss to comment,^[8] and Etymonline observes that Johnson did not give it a headword.^[4]

Timeline

• 1598 – to make a mark on something (obsolete).^[2][3]
• 1609 – to denote or signify (obsolete).^[2]
• 1693 – to add explanatory notes to a text.^[2]
• 1733 – intransitive, to make notes.^[2][4] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the intransitive use to 1710.^[9]

Meanings

Verb

1. To add critical or explanatory notes to a text, diagram or other document: She annotated the letters for the new edition.^[11][9][2]
2. To make such notes: He annotates as he reads.^[9][2][3]
3. (obsolete, 1598) To make a mark on something.^[2][3]

Word family

• annotative
• annotator
• overannotate
• annotation
• reannotate
• unannotated
• annotated

Related words

• note
• annote
• connote
• denote

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
9. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins