atoll

Etymology

It is borrowed from Dhivehi އަތޮޅު (atoḷu), the name used in the Maldive Islands, which are typical atolls.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} It first appears in English as atollon, in Purchas.^[2][6][7] Barnhart notes an earlier French attollon (1611), from Portuguese atollon, and the Random House dictionary derives the English form from French;^[6][8] Wiktionary takes it from Portuguese atol.^[1] Further back the source is uncertain.^[2][6] The OED, after Yule, suggests a link with a Malayalam word for a sinking reef,^[2][5] Barnhart and Etymonline a Malayalam word meaning "uniting, closing",^[6][9] and Hobson-Jobson, Skeat and Onions a Sinhalese word meaning "inside", from the inner lagoon.^[5][10][11] The American Heritage Dictionary takes it as probably from Sanskrit *antala- (“interior”),^[12] and Watkins as perhaps ultimately from the Sanskrit for "interior", from Proto-Indo-European *en (“in”).^[9][12] Barnhart says that no link with the Sinhalese word has been established, and that the modern French atoll was borrowed back from English in 1848.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A ring-shaped coral island enclosing a lagoon: 1625, as atollon, in Samuel Purchas's Pilgrimes, describing the Maldives.^[2][6][7] Etymonline gives the 1620s and the Random House dictionary 1615–25.^[9][13]

Semantic evolution

The word was first applied to the Maldive Islands themselves; an early account says that each atollon is separate from the others and contains a great number of small islands.^[7][6][9] It was made a scientific term, and popularized in its present form, by Charles Darwin's work on coral reefs (1842).^{[5][9][7][11]} Hobson-Jobson notes that it had already been used of such reefs in general before Darwin.^[5] Hoad dates the form atoll to the 19th century.^[14]

Timeline

• 1625 – atollon, a ring of coral islands enclosing a lagoon, in the Maldives.^[2][6]
• 1842 – atoll, made a scientific term by Darwin; also used attributively.^[15][11][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A coral island or chain of islets forming a ring around a lagoon, made by a reef that rises above the sea: The plane landed on a narrow strip of the atoll.^{[16][17][18][2]}

Usage notes

The OED's first edition (1885) gave the pronunciation with stress on the second syllable, /əˈtɒl/;^[2] British English now usually stresses the first, with the second as a variant,^[2][18] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged records second-syllable stress as occasional in American English.^[17]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f Yule, Henry; Burnell, A. C. (1903), Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, new ed. by William Crooke, London: John Murray
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
7. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b c Onions, C. T., ed. (1966), The Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
13. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
14. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
15. ^ Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
16. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
17. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
18. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins