coda

Etymology

It is borrowed from Italian coda (“tail”),^[2][3][4][5] recorded in Italian for a tail from the 13th century and for the closing passage of a piece of music by 1672,^[2] from Latin cauda (“tail”),^[2][3][6][7] also written cōda.^[8][9] The Italian word also gave French coda, in the musical sense from the early 18th century, and German Coda, by 1782.^[2] The further origin of the Latin noun is uncertain.^[10] The American Heritage Dictionary suggests that it first meant something hewn off, a part, and that it may be akin to cūdō (“to strike, beat”).^[8] De Vaan, as Etymonline reports, traces it to Proto-Italic *kaud-a- (“part; tail”), from Proto-Indo-European *kehu-d- (“cleaved, separate”), reasoning that a tail may have been named as the loose part of an animal.^[10] Partridge notes a comparison with Lithuanian kuodas (“a tuft”).^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The independent closing passage of a musical movement: 1740, in J. Grassineau's translation of S. De Brossard's musical dictionary.^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged and Etymonline date the word to about 1753,^[5][10] and Dictionary.com to 1745–55.^[11]

Semantic evolution

The word came into English as a technical term of music, already carrying the Italian extension from an animal's tail to the tail end of a composition.^[2] By 1836 it was applied figuratively to any closing event, remark or literary passage;^[2] the Shorter Oxford dates this use only to the late 19th century.^[4] Collins singles out the part at the end of a novel that tells what became of the characters.^[7] Two more technical uses followed in the 20th century: the concerted final dance of a sequence in classical ballet, from 1922,^[2] and in phonetics the consonants that close a syllable, from 1956.^[2]

Timeline

• 1740 – a closing passage in music.^[2] Etymonline dates it to 1753.^[10]
• 1836 – figuratively, a concluding event, remark or literary passage.^[2]
• 1922 – the final section of a sequence of dances in ballet.^[2][4]
• 1956 – the consonant or consonants at the end of a syllable.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. (music) A distinct closing section of a composition or movement, following its main structure, as in a fugue or rondo.^[5][2][7]
2. A concluding part of a literary or dramatic work, especially one that rounds off what came before: The novel's coda follows the sisters into old age.^[5][7]
3. Any concluding event or remark.^[2][4]
4. (ballet) The final section of a pas de deux or similar sequence of dances, or the closing dance of a whole ballet.^[2][4]
5. (phonetics) The consonant or consonant cluster that ends a syllable.^[2]

Related words

• caudal
• caudate
• coward
• queue

Usage notes

The OED enters separately the capitalized CODA, an acronym of "Children of Deaf Adults", the name of a support organization founded in 1983, recorded from 1991 for a person with a deaf or hard-of-hearing parent or guardian.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
8. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ a b Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
10. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
11. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House