cryptic

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin crypticus,^[2][3][4][5] which meant "secretive" in the 4th century, "hidden" in the 5th and "of a church crypt" in the 6th,^[2] from Ancient Greek κρυπτικός (kruptikós, “obscuring, fit for concealing”),^[2][6][7] from κρυπτός (kruptós, “hidden”),^[2][6][3] from κρύπτω (krúptō, “to hide, conceal”).^[3][7][8] It shares its source with crypt,^[6][7] and the Greek adjective is also the source of the combining form crypto-.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

As a noun, the passing on of knowledge by secret methods: 1605, in Francis Bacon's work on the advancement of learning, a sense now obsolete.^[2][9] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the sense "mysterious, enigmatic" to 1588,^[10] Dictionary.com places the word in 1595–1605,^[11] and Etymonline dates the adjective to the 1630s.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The adjective is recorded in 1617 in the sense "of a cave or grotto", soon obsolete,^[2] and in 1620 it was first used for "not immediately understandable, enigmatic".^[2] Etymonline instead dates the sense "mysterious, enigmatic" only to 1920, and the Oxford Dictionary of English to the late 19th century,^[6][12] but the OED, revised in 2011, finds it in the 17th century.^[2] The sense "secret, occult, mystical" follows before 1638,^[2] and "of the nature of a crypt" in 1772.^[2] In the late 19th century biology took the word up: from 1880 for a property that is present but not readily seen, and since 1890, in Poulton's Colours of Animals, for colouring or behaviour that camouflages an animal.^[2][10] The crossword sense, of a clue that hides its answer with anagrams, puns and similar devices, dates from 1941,^[2] and a cryptic crossword has itself been called a cryptic since 1978.^[2]

Timeline

• 1605 – noun, communication by secret methods (obsolete).^[2]
• 1617 – relating to a cave or grotto (obsolete).^[2]
• 1620 – not immediately understandable; enigmatic.^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates this sense to 1588,^[10] Etymonline to 1920.^[6]
• before 1638 – secret, concealed; occult.^[2]
• 1663 – noun, something enigmatic; a secret.^[2]
• 1772 – of the nature of a crypt.^[2]
• 1880 – biology, present but not readily detectable.^[2]
• 1890 – zoology, serving to camouflage, of colouring or behaviour.^[2]
• 1941 – of a crossword clue, using wordplay to hide the answer.^[2]
• 1978 – noun, a cryptic crossword.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Having a hidden or obscure meaning; puzzling or enigmatic: She left a cryptic note on the fridge.^[4][10][2]
2. Secret or hidden; occult.^[4][10][2]
3. (zoology) Of an animal's colouring or markings, serving to hide it by camouflage.^[4][10][2]
4. Of a crossword clue, using anagrams, puns and other indirect devices to hide the answer.^[2]
5. (biology) Present but not readily detectable.^[2]
6. Of or like a crypt.^[10][2]

Noun

1. A crossword with cryptic clues.^[2][9]
2. An enigmatic remark or piece of writing.^[2]

Word family

• cryptically
• crypticness
• anticryptic
• procryptic
• noncryptic

Related words

• crypto-
• crypt
• cryptography
• apocrypha

References

1. ^ 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 u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
9. ^ a b 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 Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
12. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press