concoction

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin concoctiō (“digestion”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} a noun of action from concoctus, the past participle of concoquō (“to boil together; to digest; to ripen; to consider well”).^[3][6][2] Barnhart allows that it may have come through Middle French concoction, but thinks it more likely taken directly from Latin.^[4] The Latin verb is formed from com- (“together”) and coquō (“to cook, prepare food, ripen, digest”),^[3][7] from Proto-Indo-European *pekʷ- (“to cook, ripen”),^[3][7] the source also of cook.^[4] It is the noun of concoct, and is related to decoction.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Digestion of food: 1531, in Elyot's Boke Named the Gouernour,^[2][4] a sense obsolete by the late 18th century.^[2][3] Etymonline dates the word to the 1530s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The old physiology distinguished a first, second and third concoction, the successive stages of digestion, the first being digestion in the stomach and intestines.^[2][8] From 1555 it was also used for ripening or maturing, the bringing of something crude to perfection,^[2][9] and since 1676 for the "ripening" of diseased matter before it was expelled from the body.^[2] Johnson (1755) still defined it as digestion in the stomach and maturation by heat, quoting Bacon.^[9] The modern senses follow those of the verb concoct, which had come to mean preparing a dish from mixed ingredients (1675) and then making up a story or scheme (1792):^[4][3] concoction for a mixed drink, broth or the like is recorded by 1802 in Etymonline and before 1851, in Hawthorne, in the OED,^[3][2] and for the making up of a plot or story from 1823 or 1831.^[4][3][2] By 1885 it could mean a made-up story, a fabrication.^[2]

Timeline

• 1531 – digestion of food (obsolete by 1788).^[2][4]
• 1555 – ripening, maturation, bringing to perfection (obsolete by 1726).^[2]
• 1594 – first, second and third concoction, the stages of digestion in the old physiology.^[2]
• 1676 – the ripening of morbid matter in disease.^[2]
• 1802 – a dish or medicine made from mixed ingredients.^[3]
• 1823 – the devising of a story or scheme.^[4][3]
• 1885 – a fabricated statement or story.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A mixture of various ingredients, especially an unusual one made as a drink, food or medicine: a bitter concoction of herbs and honey.^[5][10][2]
2. The act or process of preparing such a mixture.^[5][10][2]
3. Something invented or made up, such as a story or scheme; a fabrication or lie.^[5][10][2]
4. (obsolete) Digestion of food.^[5][2][9]
5. (obsolete) Ripening or maturation.^[5][2][9]

Related words

• concoct
• decoction
• cook
• coction
• precocious
• biscuit

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 s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c d Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
10. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins