cumbersome

Etymology

It is formed from English cumber + -some.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Dictionary.com gives the Middle English form cummyrsum.^[7] The verb cumber is probably a shortening of encumber or accumber,^[5][6][3] though Hoad notes difficulties of chronology, and the OED takes it as probably from French.^[6][2] It goes back to Old French encombrer, from combre (“obstruction, barrier”),^[4][8] from Vulgar Latin *comboros (“that which is carried together”), which is of Celtic origin, perhaps Gaulish.^[4][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of places or ways, obstructing movement, hard to get through: first recorded in a manuscript of 1487 of Barbour's Bruce, composed before 1380.^[2][5] Etymonline dates the word to the late 14th century in the sense "burdensome, troublesome".^[4]

Semantic evolution

The first sense, of rough or obstructed ground, died out by the late 17th century.^[2][3] The sense "troublesome, wearisome, oppressive" followed in 1573, in Tusser, and survived only in dialect after the 18th century;^[2] Merriam-Webster labels it chiefly dialectal.^[9] Johnson (1755) defined the word as "troublesome; vexatious" and "burthensome; embarrassing", quoting Sidney.^[10] The modern sense, of objects hard to handle because of their bulk or weight, is recorded from 1594, in Blundeville,^[2] or from the 1590s in Etymonline's dating,^[4] and was later extended to things that are slow or awkward because of their length or complexity, such as procedures.^[11][9]

Timeline

• before 1380 – of places, hard to pass through (obsolete by 1681).^[2]
• 1573 – troublesome, wearisome.^[2]
• 1594 – unwieldy because of bulk or weight.^[2][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Hard to carry or handle because of its size, weight or shape; unwieldy: a cumbersome trunk.^[11][9][2]
2. Slow or awkward because of its length or complexity; inefficient: a cumbersome approval process.^[11][9]
3. (dialect) Burdensome, troublesome.^[9][2]
4. (obsolete, 1487–1681) Of a place or way, hard to pass through.^[2][9]

Word family

• cumbersomely
• cumbersomeness

Related words

• cumber
• encumber
• cumbrous
• encumbrance

Usage notes

Cumbrous, formed with the suffix -ous and recorded from the 14th century, is a near-synonym.^[11][6]

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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins