comb

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English comb, inherited from Old English camb, later, chiefly in Anglian, comb,^[2][3][4][5] inherited from Proto-West Germanic *kamb,^[6] inherited from Proto-Germanic *kambaz,^[3][2][7][8] literally "toothed object".^[3] It is cognate with Old Saxon camb, Old High German kamb, German Kamm, Dutch kam and Old Norse kambr.^[2][9][4][7] The Germanic word comes from Proto-Indo-European *ǵómbʰos (“tooth”),^[6][7][8][2] from the root Proto-Indo-European *ǵembʰ- (“tooth, nail; to bite”),^[3][10][11] which also gave Ancient Greek γόμφος (gómphos, “peg, bolt”) and γομφίος (gomphíos, “molar tooth”), Sanskrit जम्भ (jámbha, “tooth, tusk”), Tocharian A kam (“tooth”), Tocharian B keme (“tooth”), Albanian dhëmb (“tooth”), Old Church Slavonic зѫбъ (zǫbŭ, “tooth”) and Lithuanian žam̃bas (“sharp edge”).^{[2][12][10][6]} Ayto thinks cam is probably a borrowing of the Dutch cognate.^[8] The verb, formed from the noun, replaced the older Old English cemban, which lived on dialectally as kemb and survives in unkempt.^{[3][4][8][13]}

Earliest recorded meaning

A toothed strip for dressing the hair: Old English, in the Epinal Glossary.^[4][2] Old English camb also meant the fleshy crest of a cock, so called from its serrations, and the crest of a helmet,^[3][14][5] and Bosworth–Toller records a feminine camb for a honeycomb.^[14]

Semantic evolution

Comb-like tools for textiles followed: Etymonline dates the wool-carding comb from about 1300 and notes Comber as a surname from about 1200,^[3][2] and a horse comb or currycomb is recorded from about 1440.^[4] The use for honeycomb is exclusively English and of doubtful origin;^[15][8] Ayto dates it to the 13th century, Hoad to late Old English, in huniġcamb.^[8][15] From the crest of a cock the word passed to other crests, of a helmet (1834), a roof (1824) or a wave (1886).^[16][5] Since the 16th century to cut someone's comb has meant to make them less proud.^[13][5] The verb is first recorded in Trevisa's translation of Bartholomew (1398), of combing hair or currying a horse;^[4][2][3] Barnhart dates the verb itself, as opposed to the participle, to 1495.^[2] It was used of carding wool from 1577,^[4][3] humorously of beating someone from 1600,^[4][17] of waves rolling over and breaking from 1807,^[4][5] and, originally in American English, of searching closely from 1904, in O. Henry.^[4][3] In the First World War to comb out meant to pick men out of civilian jobs for military service (1916).^[4][5] In 16th-century underworld slang a comb was the hooked pole used to pull goods out of shop windows.^[17] Scots and northern dialects kept older forms such as kaim and kame.^[18][5]

Timeline

• c. 700 – a toothed strip for the hair, in the Epinal Glossary.^[4][2]
• Old English – the crest of a cock.^[16][3]
• c. 1300 – a comb for carding wool.^[3]
• 1398 – verb, to comb the hair; to curry a horse.^[4][2]
• c. 1440 – a currycomb.^[4]
• 1577 – verb, to card wool or flax.^[4]
• 1600 – verb, humorously, to beat.^[4][17]
• 1807 – verb, of a wave, to roll over and break.^[4]
• 1891 – the fixed cutter of a sheep-shearing machine (Australia and New Zealand).^[4]
• 1904 – verb, to search closely.^[4][3]
• 1916 – comb out, to pick men out for military service.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A strip of plastic, metal, bone or other material with a row of teeth, used to tidy, arrange or hold the hair.^[19][9][5]
2. A toothed tool or machine for separating and straightening wool, cotton or other fibres.^[19][9][5]
3. A currycomb.^[19][4]
4. The red fleshy crest on the head of a domestic fowl, or a similar growth on other birds.^[19][5]
5. Something like a cock's comb, such as the crest of a helmet, a hill or a wave.^[5][16]
6. A honeycomb.^[19][5]
7. (Australia, New Zealand) The fixed lower cutter of a sheep-shearing machine.^[19][5][4]
8. An act of combing: Give your fringe a quick comb.^[5][4]

Verb

1. To draw a comb through the hair, to tidy or arrange it: She combed her son's hair before school.^[19][9][4]
2. To dress wool, flax or other fibres with a comb.^[9][4][5]
3. To search a place thoroughly: Volunteers combed the woods for the missing dog.^[5][4][19]
4. Of a wave, to roll over and break with a foamy crest.^[5][4]
5. comb out: to remove tangles from the hair with a comb; to pick out or remove systematically.^[5][4]

Word family

• combed
• comblike
• combless
• comb-over
• currycomb
• comb-out

Related words

• kempt
• unkempt
• kemb
• honeycomb
• cockscomb
• coxcomb
• cam
• kame

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
7. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b c d e f Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
9. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
12. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
13. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
15. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
16. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
17. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
18. ^ 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)
19. ^ a b c d e f g h Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins