canister

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin canistrum (“a basket for bread, fruit or flowers”),^[2][3][4][5] from Ancient Greek κάναστρον (kánastron, “wicker basket”),^[2][6][3][7] apparently from κάννα (kánna, “reed”),^[2][6][8] the source of cane.^[3][8][4] Dictionary.com explains the Greek ending as a variant of the suffix of instrument nouns.^[9] The sense "small metal box" was helped, according to Etymonline and Weekley, by the unrelated can.^[4][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

A basket: Barnhart dates the word probably to 1474,^[3] and Etymonline, the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English to the late 15th century.^[4][7][11] The OED's first record is from 1678, for an instrument used in racking off wine.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The Latin word named a wicker basket for bread, fruit or flowers,^[3][2] and the English basket sense survived mainly in literary use, as in Dryden's translation of Virgil (1697), which Johnson (1755) quoted for "a small basket".^[2][7][12] From 1711 the word meant a small case or box, usually of metal, for tea, coffee or shot,^[2][4] a change Etymonline puts down to the influence of can;^[4] Johnson already gave this sense as his second.^[12] In the early 18th century a canister was also a quantity of tea, from 75 to 100 pounds.^[2] From 1801 it was short for canister shot, small balls packed in a case and fired from a cannon, so called from the casing.^[2][4][7] The verb, to put in a canister or to tie a canister to a dog's tail, is recorded from 1815.^[2][7] In Yorkshire, Cheshire and Lincolnshire dialect canister was a slang word for the head.^[13]

Timeline

• 1474 – a basket (probable date).^[3] The OED's first quotation for this sense is from Dryden, 1697.^[2]
• 1678 – an instrument used in racking off wine (obsolete).^[2]
• 1704 – a quantity of tea of 75 to 100 pounds (recorded to 1721).^[2]
• 1711 – a small box or case, usually of metal, for tea, coffee, shot and the like.^[2][4]
• 1801 – short for canister shot.^[2][4]
• 1815 – verb, to put in a canister; to tie a canister to a dog's tail.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A container, usually of metal and with a close-fitting lid, for keeping dry goods such as tea, coffee or flour: She kept the sugar in a blue canister by the stove.^[14][15][2]
2. Any of various cylindrical metal containers.^[15]
3. (historical) Canister shot: a case packed with small balls, fired at close range from a cannon.^{[14][15][2][7]}
4. (archaic) A small basket for bread, fruit or flowers.^{[15][7][2][12]}

Verb

1. To put or enclose in a canister.^[15][2][7]

Related words

• canasta
• cane
• can
• canaster
• cannon

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
10. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
11. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., 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. ^ 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)
14. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
15. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster