annular

Etymology

It is borrowed from Medieval Latin anularis, also annularis,^[2][3][4][5] and partly borrowed from Middle French annulaire,^{[2][3][4][6][7]} which is from the same Latin word.^[4] In post-classical Latin the adjective meant first "bearing a ring", of the ring finger (in Isidore), and in a British source of the 13th century "ring-shaped";^[2] classical Latin had only the neuter noun ānulāre, a white paint.^[2] It is formed from ānulus (“a ring”) and -āris,^[2][8] the spelling with a double n being a later or mistaken form.^[3][5][8] Ānulus is a diminutive of ānus (“ring”),^{[9][3][5][8][10]} The Oxford English Dictionary connects it with an Armenian word for a necklace or ring.^[2] The Latin words are the sources of annulus and anus.^[3][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Ring-shaped: perhaps before 1560, in L. Digges's Pantometria, printed in 1571.^[2] Merriam-Webster and Barnhart date the word to 1571,^[4][9] Etymonline to the 1570s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its basic meaning, "shaped like a ring", and spread into the sciences.^[2][4] Anatomy and medicine used it from 1578 of ring-shaped parts and lesions,^[2] and Johnson (1755) illustrated it with "annular ligaments" from Cheyne.^[11] The astronomical annular eclipse, in which a ring of the sun stays visible around the moon, is recorded from 1706, after French éclipse annulaire and Latin eclipsis annularis;^[2] Etymonline dates the phrase to 1727.^[3] Botany used it of cell walls thickened in rings,^[6][4] and chemistry for "cyclic".^[4] In the 17th century it was also used of the ring finger, the fourth finger of the left hand, as in post-classical Latin.^[6][2]

Timeline

• before 1560 – ring-shaped, in a text printed in 1571 (the date is uncertain).^[2] Merriam-Webster and Barnhart give 1571.^[4][9]
• 1578 – in anatomy, of a ring-shaped part of the body.^[2]
• mid 17th century – of the ring finger.^[6]
• 1706 – of a solar eclipse that leaves a ring of the sun visible.^[2] Etymonline dates annular eclipse to 1727.^[3]
• 1809 – in architecture, of a vault over the ring-shaped space between two concentric walls.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Shaped like a ring; forming or consisting of rings: annular growth rings in a tree trunk.^[4][12][2]
2. (astronomy) Of a solar eclipse: one in which the moon covers the middle of the sun's disc and leaves a bright ring around it.^[2][6][3]
3. (anatomy) Of a part of the body or a lesion: ring-shaped.^[2]
4. (botany) Banded, marked or thickened in rings: an annular cell.^[4][6]
5. (chemistry) Cyclic.^[4]

Word family

• annularity
• annularly
• transannular
• interannular
• penannular
• annular eclipse

Related words

• annulus
• anus
• annulet
• annelid

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 o p q r Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
10. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins