Etymologically
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broth

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Pronunciation

  • UK: /bɹɒθ/[1]
  • US: /bɹɔθ/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English broth,[2][3] inherited from Old English broþ,[4][5][6][7] from Proto-Germanic *bruþą,[6][8][9] a derivative of the base of brew, brēowan.[8][7][10][11] It is cognate with Old High German brod,[4][8][5] Old Saxon broth[5][9] and Old Norse broð.[4][6][7] Etymonline traces it to Proto-Indo-European *bhreu- (“to boil, bubble, effervesce, burn”),[6][12][13] and Klein and Merriam-Webster compare Latin dēfrutum (“must boiled down”) and Old Irish bruth (“heat”).[14][3] The Germanic word was borrowed into the Romance languages: Medieval Latin brodum gave Italian brodo and Old French breu,[8][4][6] and Vulgar Latin *brodo gave broez, the source of brose, a Scottish porridge.[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The liquid in which meat or other food has been boiled: Old English, in the Colloquium Monasticum, which says that the monks may have fætt broþ, rich broth.[4][5] Barnhart dates the word to before 1000.[8]

Semantic evolution

The core meaning has stayed the same since Old English.[4][13] Ayto notes that the idea of heating, implied by the root, survived into the early modern period in compounds such as snow-broth, melted snow, from the end of the 16th century;[13] the OED records broth loosely for various boiled or brewed liquors, and for brine, from before 1475 to 1774.[4] From about 1515 it was used figuratively,[4] and in bacteriology from 1885 for a liquid culture medium.[4][3] The Irish phrase a broth of a boy, a fine lively fellow,[4][11] was explained by Weekley, after Joyce, as "the essence of manhood, as broth is the essence of meat";[15] Etymonline mentions the alternative view, reported by Farmer, that it comes from an Irish word for passion.[6] In Scotland and much of northern and midland England broth was treated as a plural, as in "a few broth".[16]

Timeline

  • before 1000 – Old English broþ, the liquid in which food is boiled.[4][8]
  • before 1475 – various boiled or brewed liquors (obsolete by 1774).[4]
  • c. 1515 – figurative uses.[4]
  • 1645 – to make white broth of, to boil to death.[4]
  • 1885 – bacteriology, a liquid culture medium.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The liquid in which meat, fish, grain or vegetables have been cooked; stock: chicken broth.[17][3][4]
  2. A thin soup made from such a liquid, often with vegetables.[17][4]
  3. (bacteriology) A liquid culture medium.[3][4]
  4. a broth of a boy (Irish): a fine, spirited fellow.[4][11]

Word family

  • brothy
  • hellbroth
  • snow-broth
  • Scotch broth

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  3. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  6. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  7. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  9. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  10. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  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. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  13. ^ 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
  14. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  15. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  16. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
  17. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins