Etymologically
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bathe

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English bathen, also baðien,[2][3][4] inherited from Old English baþian (“to wash, bathe”), also beþian,[5][6][7][8] from Proto-Germanic *baþōną,[9][10] a verb formed from the noun that gave bath.[5][10][6][7] Its cognates are Old Norse baða, Old High German badōn (modern baden), Dutch baden, Swedish bada and Danish bade.[9][5][11][10] Barnhart traces the root further to Proto-Indo-European *bhē-.[9] The different vowel and consonant of bath and bathe go back to the extra syllable and open vowel of the Old English verb, as in grass and graze.[5][9][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Old English the verb meant to wash, to put in a bath and to take a bath:[6][8] Barnhart's first record is before 899, in Alfred's translation of Orosius,[9] and the OED's earliest is the Old English sense of wetting all over with a liquid, in a medical text.[5]

Semantic evolution

From Old English the verb was used both transitively, of washing a body or wetting something all over, and with a reflexive pronoun, of washing oneself.[5][8][7] In Middle English Laȝamon's Brut already uses it for taking a bath,[2] and Chaucer, who used the verb eleven times, also had it for basking.[12][5] To bathe in blood, for great bloodshed, is recorded from about 1300.[5] From the 16th century it was used of rivers and the sea washing the land,[5][7] of tears or sweat running over the body,[5] and of light or air surrounding or suffusing something (1816).[5][7] Johnson (1755) gave as its first sense "to wash in a bath".[13] In modern usage British and American English differ: in Britain bathe usually means to swim in the sea or a river for pleasure, and a bathe is such a swim, while in American English it is the usual verb for washing in a bathtub.[14][4] The noun is dated 1747 by the Merriam-Webster Unabridged and 1827 by the OED.[4][5]

Timeline

  • before 899 – to wash, bathe, in Alfred's Orosius.[9]
  • before 1200 – to immerse the body in water for health or cleanliness.[5]
  • c. 1300 – to bathe in blood.[5]
  • c. 1386 – to immerse in other substances, in Chaucer.[5]
  • 1578 – of tears or sweat, to wet the body.[5]
  • 1591 – of a river or the sea, to wash the land, in Spenser.[5]
  • 1747 – noun, a bath or swim.[4] The OED's first record is 1827.[5]
  • 1816 – to suffuse or envelop, like light or air.[5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (chiefly British) To swim or play in the sea, a river or a lake for pleasure: The children bathed in the cove all afternoon.[14][7]
  2. To apply water or another liquid to something to clean or soothe it: He bathed the cut on his knee.[14][7]
  3. To immerse, or be immersed, in a liquid.[14][5]
  4. (chiefly US, Canada) To wash in a bath; to give a bath to: bathe the dog.[14][4]
  5. To suffuse or surround, as light does: The valley was bathed in moonlight.[14][7][5]
  6. Of the sea or a river, to wash against a shore.[14][5]

Noun

  1. (British) A swim or dip in the sea, a river or a lake.[14][4][7]

Word family

  • bather
  • sunbathe
  • rebathe
  • bathing suit

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b 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. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  4. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  9. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  10. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  12. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
  13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins