carrion

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English careine, also caroine, caronye and carion,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman careine, also caroine,^[5][6][4][7] beside Old Northern French caroigne and central Old French charoigne,^[3][8][9] now French charogne.^[3][10] The Anglo-Norman word, recorded as charoine from 1121–25, could mean carrion, a corpse, the body as opposed to the soul, or living flesh.^[11] The source is Vulgar Latin *carōnia (“carcass”),^{[10][6][12][5]} also the source of Italian carogna and Spanish carroña,^[10][12][3] from Latin carō (“flesh, meat”),^[10][6][12] from Proto-Indo-European *sker- (“to cut”).^[10][5] The OED notes that the Romance form is not regularly built on the stem of the genitive carnis,^[3] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged also calls it irregular.^[4] Partridge instead takes it as a variant of *cariōnia, from cariēs (“decay”).^[13] According to Barnhart, the spelling with two rs was established after the 1550s.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A dead body, a corpse or carcass: about 1225, in the Ancrene Riwle,^[3][10] which Barnhart dates probably before 1200 and gives with the spellings caroine and charoine.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The word first meant any corpse, and that sense lasted until 1763.^[3] Before the end of the 13th century the present sense, dead and rotting flesh unfit to eat, had begun to establish itself,^[14][3][10] and Johnson (1755) defined it as the carcass of something not proper for food.^[15] Contempt for the body came quickly: from 1377, in Piers Plowman, carrion could mean the living human body, then, in the late 15th and the 16th centuries, a pest or a worthless person.^[3] Green's Dictionary of Slang records it for a prostitute, starting from Shakespeare's "contaminated carrion weight" in Troilus and Cressida.^[16] The adjective, which the OED records from before 1535 and the Shorter Oxford from late Middle English, was used of rotting flesh and of things vile.^[3][9] The compound carrion crow is recorded from 1528, in the writings of Sir Thomas More.^[6] In Scots and English dialects the word was a term of reproach for a man or woman from Banffshire and Westmorland to Herefordshire, carrion names in Huntingdonshire were disgusting ones, and a box of carrion in west Somerset was a corpse.^[17]

Timeline

• c. 1225 – a dead body, a corpse or carcass (obsolete by 1763).^[3][10]
• 1297 – dead and putrefying flesh.^[3]
• before 1325 – the form carion, in Cursor Mundi.^[6]
• 1377 – contemptuously, the living human body.^[3]
• 1477 – a living animal regarded as vermin or as worthless (obsolete by 1639).^[3]
• c. 1529 – figuratively, something corrupt or loathsome.^[3]
• before 1535 – adjective, consisting of corrupting flesh.^[3]
• 1547 – contemptuously, a living person (obsolete by 1661).^[3]
• 1826 – adjective, rotten, vile, loathsome.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. The dead and rotting flesh of an animal, especially as food for scavengers: Vultures circled above the carrion on the plain.^[7][4][5][3]
2. Something rotten, corrupt or repulsive.^[7][9][3]
3. (obsolete, 1225–1763) A dead body; a corpse or carcass.^[3][4][9]
4. (obsolete, 1477–1639) A worthless or noxious animal; vermin.^[3][4][9]
5. (obsolete, 1547–1661) A contemptible living person.^[3][9]

Adjective

1. Of or like dead and decaying flesh.^[5][3]
2. Feeding on such flesh: carrion beetles.^[5][7][15]
3. Rotten, vile or loathsome.^[3][9]

Word family

• carrion beetle
• carrion crow
• carrion flower

Related words

• crone
• carnal
• carnage
• carnival

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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 i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
7. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
8. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c d e f g Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
11. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
12. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
13. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
14. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
15. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
17. ^ 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)