brooch

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English broche, also brouche,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French broche (“long needle, spit”),^[5][6][7][8] and it is the same word as broach, the two differing only in specialized sense and spelling.^{[9][3][10][11]} Ayto says that English took the French word first as brooch in the 13th century and again as broach in the 14th.^[6] The OED gives broke and broque as Old Northern French forms and compares Spanish broca and Italian brocca.^[9] The source is Vulgar Latin *brocca (“spike, pointed tool”),^[5][7][6] the noun use of the feminine of Latin broccus (“projecting, pointed”), used especially of teeth,^[5][7][4] which Etymonline suggests is perhaps of Gaulish origin, comparing Scottish Gaelic brog (“awl”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

An ornamental pin or fastening: about 1225, in the Ancrene Riwle,^[9] which Barnhart dates to probably before 1200.^[3] Etymonline says the early 13th century,^[5] and Merriam-Webster the 13th century.^[4]

Semantic evolution

A brooch began as a long pin, and Ayto notes that it was at first a decorative pin mainly for fastening a garment, and that over the centuries decoration replaced the practical use.^[6] Middle English had the sense of a pointed tool and of an ornament under one word.^[2][4] The word also spread to jewels in general: from before 1382, in the Wycliffite Bible, until 1663 it could mean a necklace, a bracelet or another trinket,^[9][3] and Johnson (1755) still defined it as "a jewel; an ornament of jewels".^[12] From before 1464, in Capgrave, until 1631 it was used figuratively of a person or thing prized like a gem,^[9] as in Johnson's quotation from Hamlet, "he is the brooch, indeed, / And gem of all the nation".^[12] The verb, to adorn as with a brooch, appears before 1616, in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra.^[9][12] The spelling split from broach only slowly: Etymonline puts it in the 14th century,^[5] Dictionary.com about 1600,^[13] and the OED, in text of 1888, calls it recent and hardly yet established.^[9]

Timeline

• c. 1225 – an ornamental fastening, as broche.^[9][3]
• before 1333 – the form brouche.^[3]
• before 1382 – any jewel or trinket (obsolete by 1663); the spelling brooch in the Wycliffe Bible.^[9][3]
• before 1464 – figurative, a person or thing prized like a jewel (obsolete by 1631).^[9]
• before 1616 – verb, to adorn as with a brooch.^[9]
• 1706 – a painting in one colour (only in dictionaries).^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. An ornament with a hinged pin and catch, worn fastened to clothing: She pinned a silver brooch to her lapel.^[8][4][9]
2. (obsolete, before 1382–1663) Any jewel or trinket.^[9][4][11]

Verb

1. (rare) To adorn or fasten with a brooch, or as if with one.^[4][9][11]

Related words

• broach
• brochure
• brochette
• broccoli

Usage notes

Barnhart explains the usual pronunciation with /oʊ/ by the word's identity with broach, and sees the pronunciation /uː/ as a spelling pronunciation, perhaps helped by the Scottish and northern dialect form bruche.^[3] The OED calls the latter occasional,^[9] and Merriam-Webster lists it as a secondary form.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b 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. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
7. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
11. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b c Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House