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crawl

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Etymology and origin of the English word crawl

English has a verb crawl, to creep, with its noun, and a separate noun crawl, a pen for fish or turtles, from Dutch.[1][2][3]

Pronunciation

  • UK: /kɹɔːl/[4]
  • US: /kɹɔl/, /kɹɑl/[4]

crawl1 creep; slow movement

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
a1225 (c1200), Vices and Virtues
Borrowed from
Old Norse krafla
Ultimate origin
Old Norse krafla

Etymology

The verb is probably borrowed from Old Norse krafla (“to paw, scrabble with the hands”),[1][2][5][6] in Middle English craulen, earlier creulen.[7][8][9] Barnhart and the OED compare kravle, kravle (“to crawl, climb up”) and kravla,[8][1] and the Middle English Dictionary also compares crevelen, suggesting some Low German influence.[7] The OED notes that the word was rare in Middle English and apparently northern, and that no matching Old English verb is recorded.[1][9] Klein, Weekley and Etymonline connect it with crab,[5][6][9] and Weekley takes its original sense to be "to claw one's way".[6] Hoad, the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English call the origin unknown, comparing only the Scandinavian verbs.[10][3][11] Johnson (1755) derived it from Dutch.[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

To swarm or be crawling with something: about 1200, in Vices and Virtues, where a foul belly is "crawling full of worms".[7] The sense "to move slowly with the body close to the ground" is first recorded in the Cursor Mundi (a1400, composed about 1325).[1]

Semantic evolution

The sense "to feel as if things were crawling over the skin" is equally old, in another manuscript of the Cursor Mundi,[1] and Etymonline dates it to about 1300.[9] From the 15th century the verb was used of people walking slowly and draggingly,[1][7][9] and Shakespeare used it figuratively for very slow progress in King Lear and for stealthy or abject movement in Henry VIII.[1] Johnson (1755) defined it as to creep, to move slowly without rising from the ground, "as a worm".[12] The sense "to be alive with crawling things" is recorded from 1576;[1] in Scots and in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire dialect it was used of insects and vermin swarming, as in "the bed crawls wi' fleas".[13] The sense "to behave servilely, to toady" is recorded in Green's from about 1790,[14] though the OED's first example is RAF slang of 1943.[1] The noun came from the verb: the act of crawling from 1817, in Shelley's Laon and Cythna,[1][8][9] a leisurely round of public houses, pub-crawl or gin-crawl, from 1877,[1][14] and the swimming stroke from 1903.[1][9] According to Etymonline, the stroke was so called because the swimmer's movement resembles crawling.[9] In film and television, lines of text moving across the screen have been called a crawl since 1948.[1]

Timeline

  • c1200 – to swarm or teem (with worms).[7]
  • a1400 – to move with the body close to the ground.[1]
  • a1400 – to have a creeping sensation on the skin.[1]
  • c1460 – to walk slowly and draggingly.[1]
  • 1576 – to be alive with crawling things.[1]
  • a1616 – to move or progress very slowly (Shakespeare).[1]
  • 1637 – of plants, to spread over a surface (Milton).[1]
  • c1790 – (slang) to behave sycophantically.[14]
  • 1817 – noun, the act of crawling.[1]
  • 1877 – noun, a slow round of drinking places.[1]
  • 1903 – noun, the swimming stroke.[1][9]
  • 1911 – verb, to swim the crawl.[1]
  • 1948 – noun, text moving across a screen.[1]

Modern meaning

Verb

  1. To move slowly on hands and knees, or with the body close to the ground, as a baby or a snake does.
  2. To move or progress very slowly: Cars crawled through the roadworks for an hour.
  3. (informal) To behave in a servile way in order to win favour; to fawn or grovel.
  4. To be covered or swarming with crawling creatures or other unpleasant things: The old shed was crawling with spiders.
  5. Of the skin, to feel as if insects were moving over it, from fear or disgust.
  6. To swim using the crawl.

Noun

  1. The act of crawling; a slow, creeping movement or pace.
  2. A fast swimming stroke in which the swimmer lies face down, kicks the legs and brings each arm over the head in turn.
  3. (chiefly British) A slow round of several bars or pubs, usually pub crawl.
  4. Lines of text that move across a film or television screen.

Word family

  • crawler
  • crawlingly
  • crawly
  • pub crawl
  • crawl space

crawl2 pen in water

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1661, E. Hickeringill, Jamaica Viewed
Borrowed from
Dutch kraal

Etymology

The pen is borrowed from Dutch kraal,[1][2][5] which the OED derives from corral;[1] the Shorter Oxford takes it from curral.[3] Weekley calls it a variant of corral and kraal.[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the West Indies, an enclosure or building for keeping hogs: 1661, in Edmund Hickeringill's Jamaica Viewed.[1][3]

Semantic evolution

From 1682 it was used of a pen of stakes and hurdles in shallow coastal water, or a tank, for keeping fish, turtles or lobsters,[1][3] and Smyth's Sailor's Word-Book (1867) also defines it as a pen on the African coast for enslaved people awaiting shipment.[1] In the late 18th century it was also used for a village or enclosure of huts in southern Africa, the sense now carried by kraal.[1][3]

Timeline

  • 1661 – a hog pen in the West Indies.[1]
  • 1682 – a pen in shallow water for fish or turtles.[1]
  • 1771 – a southern African village or kraal (obsolete).[1]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. An enclosure in shallow water, or a tank, for keeping live fish, turtles or lobsters.

References

  1. ^ 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 29 30 31 32 33 34 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  2. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  3. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  5. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  6. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  7. ^ a b c d e 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)
  8. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  12. ^ 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.
  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 c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Crawl.” Etymologically, 22 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/en/crawl. Accessed 23 Oct. 2026.

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