bruise

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English brusen, also brisen,^[2][3][4] inherited from Old English brȳsan (“to crush, pound, bruise”),^{[5][6][7][8][9]} and in Middle English it was also borrowed from Anglo-Norman bruser and bruisier (“to break, smash”), now briser, which reinforced and partly replaced the native verb.^{[8][6][10][11]} The OED thinks it is probably a partial merger of the Old English verb with Anglo-Norman and Old French brisier (“to break, smash”) and with the Anglo-Norman and Old French verb named above, which is recorded as "to cause a bruise" in Anglo-Norman from 1268.^[12] Barnhart writes that the native form brise and the French form bruse existed side by side from about 1200 until bruise, from the French, was established by the mid-17th century.^[11] Etymonline traces the Old English verb to Proto-Germanic *brusjan and Proto-Indo-European *bhreu- (“to smash, cut, break up”),^[5] and Barnhart to Proto-Indo-European *bhreus-;^[11] it is related to brosnian (“to decay, crumble”),^[6][12][13] and compared with Latin frustum (“a piece broken off”) and Old Irish bronnaim (“I wrong, I hurt”).^{[5][3][13][14]} The French verb is of uncertain origin:^[12][8] Merriam-Webster and Partridge take it as Celtic,^[2][4] Barnhart and Etymonline as perhaps Gaulish.^[11][5] Ayto stresses that the Old English and the French verb are unrelated, and that the French one mainly affected the spelling.^[14]

Earliest recorded meaning

To injure, batter or crush with a heavy weight or blow: in Old English, in King Alfred's translation of the Psalms,^[12] with Old English recorded before 900 in Barnhart.^[11][15] Bosworth-Toller glosses the Old English verb as "to bruise", Latin conterere.^[9]

Semantic evolution

The old general sense was to crush or batter; only later did it narrow to an injury from a blow that discolours the skin without breaking it.^[12][8] From the 14th to the 17th century the word could also mean simply "to break or smash", which Ayto puts down to the influence of the French verb rather than to the Old English meaning;^[14][12] he quotes a 1590 account of a man who would have been bruised in pieces had he slipped.^[14] The figurative sense of wearing a person down is also Old English, and in later use became hurting someone's pride or feelings.^[12] The verb was used of crushing food with a pestle from the Wycliffite Bible on,^[12] of damaging fruit from 1523,^[12] and of denting metal or wood from 1530.^[12] The noun, at first "a break, a breach", came from the verb in the 16th century;^[12][8][11] the modern sense, a discoloured injury, dates from 1533 in the OED,^[12] 1541 in Merriam-Webster and Barnhart.^[2][11] In fox-hunting slang of the 19th century to bruise along was to ride hard and recklessly,^[12] and in Scotland and Westmorland the verb meant to crush or squeeze.^[16]

Timeline

• before 900 – Old English brȳsan, to crush or injure with a blow.^[11][12]
• before 1200 – Middle English brisen.^[11]
• before 1382 – to break or smash (obsolete by 1667); to pound or grind food.^[12]
• c. 1465 – to press or squeeze, later Scottish.^[12]
• 1523 – to damage fruit or plants by a blow.^[12]
• 1530 – noun, a break or breach (obsolete by 1616); verb, to dent metal or wood.^[12]
• 1533 – noun, a discoloured injury beneath the skin.^[12] Merriam-Webster and Barnhart date it to 1541.^[2][11]
• 1610 – noun, a dent or mark on metal, stone or wood.^[12]
• 1670 – noun, a discoloured spot on fruit.^[12]
• 1833 – fox-hunting slang, to ride hard and recklessly (obsolete by 1885).^[12]
• 1849 – intransitive, to become bruised.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. An injury from a blow that does not break the skin but leaves a discoloured area from bleeding beneath it; a contusion.^[17][2][12]
2. A similar damaged spot on a fruit or plant.^[17][12]
3. A dent or mark on the surface of metal, wood or stone.^[12][2]
4. (obsolete, 1530–1616) A break or breach.^[12][8]

Verb

1. To injure the flesh by a blow without breaking the skin: She bruised her shin on the bed frame.^[17][2][12]
2. To become bruised: Ripe peaches bruise easily.^[17][12]
3. To hurt someone's feelings or pride.^[17][12]
4. To damage the surface of something by a blow.^[17][12]
5. To crush or pound food, as with a pestle.^[17][12]
6. (obsolete, 1382–1667) To break or smash.^[12][14]

Word family

• unbruised
• bruiser
• bruising
• stone bruise

Related words

• debris
• frustum
• brisance

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
3. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
4. ^ a b Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
5. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
10. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
14. ^ a b c d e Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
15. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
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 c d e f g Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins