Etymologically
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boy

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /bɔɪ/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English boi (also boie), a word of unknown or uncertain origin.[2][3][4][5] Several explanations have been proposed.[2][3] It is compared with East Frisian boi, “young gentleman”, with Middle Dutch boeve (“knave”) and Middle High German buobe (“boy”),[3][2][5][6] and with the Old English personal names Bōia and Bōfa,[7][8][6] which Klein and Etymonline put in a gradational relationship with babe.[8][2] Hoad and Barnhart suggest instead an Anglo-French *embuié (“fettered”), from Old French embuier (“to fetter”), from Latin boia (“leg iron, yoke”), from Greek βοεῖαι (boeîai, “ox hides”), which would explain the sense “servant”.[9][3][2][10] According to Liberman, modern boy looks like a blend of an onomatopoeic word for an evil spirit, “boi”, and a baby word for “brother”, “bo”.[11][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A male servant: about 1225, in King Horn;[3] Barnhart records boi and boie in 1154.[3] Etymonline gives “servant, commoner, knave” from the mid-13th century,[2] and Liberman dates the word to 1260.[11]

Semantic evolution

“Rascal, ruffian, urchin” is from about 1300.[2] A male child is recorded from about 1300 in the OED[12] and the mid-14th century in Etymonline, perhaps extended from the sense “urchin”;[2] Liberman notes that in texts this meaning does not appear before 1400.[11] Etymonline points out that words for “boy” often double as “servant” across the Indo-European languages, as with French garçon and Greek pais.[2] Liberman thinks the derogatory senses of Middle English boy go back to *boi, “devil”, and that boy “servant” survives in compounds such as bellboy.[11] The word was used slightingly of young men in Middle English, and locally, in Cornwall, Ireland and the American West, for “a man” of any age.[2][12] That's my boy is from the late 16th century.[5] The derogatory use for a non-white male servant or labourer is from the 17th century onward.[9][12] The interjection boy! expresses surprise or delight.[13] Boyish is from 1548 and boyhood from before 1745, in Swift.[3]

Timeline

  • 1154 – boi (Barnhart).[3]
  • c. 1225 – a servant (King Horn).[3]
  • c. 1300 – a rascal; a male child.[2][12]
  • 1548 – boyish.[3]
  • late 16th century – that's my boy.[5]
  • 1730 – “a man”, in some localities.[12]
  • before 1745 – boyhood (Swift).[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A male child or youth.
  2. An inexperienced young man.
  3. A son.
  4. (informal) A man; a fellow: one of the boys.
  5. (archaic) A male servant.

Interjection

  1. Used to express surprise, delight or disgust.

Word family

  • boyhood
  • boyish
  • boyishly
  • boyishness
  • babe
  • baby
  • boyfriend
  • bellboy
  • attaboy

Usage notes

A separate obsolete boy, “a fetter”, is recorded from 1375.[12]

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  9. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  10. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  11. ^ a b c d Liberman, Anatoly (2008), An Analytic Dictionary of English Etymology: An Introduction, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
  12. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  13. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin