depict

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English depicten,^[2][3] borrowed from Latin dēpictus (“painted, portrayed”), the past participle of dēpingō (“to portray, paint, sketch; describe”),^{[4][5][6][7][8]} formed from dē- and pingō (“to paint”),^{[4][9][3][10]} and related to paint and picture.^[4][6][5] Etymonline and Barnhart read the prefix as "down", Skeat and the Oxford Dictionary of English as "fully, completely".^{[4][5][11][12]} The American Heritage Dictionary traces pingō to Proto-Indo-European *peig-.^[3] The OED notes a single example of Old French depicter from 1426 in Godefroy, which cannot have shaped the English verb, and compares depaint.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

To portray, paint or draw; also to write or inscribe, and figuratively to colour falsely or disguise.^[2] Barnhart's first record, before 1420 in Lydgate's “Troy Book”, has the sense "to disguise", and "to portray, paint, draw" follows about 1430.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The early verb was rare: Hoad notes only one 15th-century participle depictyd,^[13] and the OED has a participial adjective depict, "depicted", from about 1430 to 1598,^[9][13] but the verb itself only from 1631.^[9] Collins and Dictionary.com likewise date the verb to the 17th century,^[14][10] while Etymonline, the MED, the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English place it in the 15th.^{[4][2][8][12]} Etymonline dates the extension to describing in words to the mid-15th century,^[4] the OED to 1713;^[9] Hoad gives "represent in colours" in the 17th century and "portray" in the 18th.^[13] Johnson (1755) gave "to paint; to portray; to represent in colours" and "to describe; to represent an action to the mind".^[15] It was used of showing something as if by painting from 1817, and of a picture itself representing something from 1871.^[9]

Timeline

• before 1420 – depicten, to disguise (Lydgate).^[5]
• c. 1430 – to portray, paint, draw;^[5] adjective depict, depicted.^[9]
• 1631 – verb, to represent in colours, to portray.^[9]
• 1713 – to describe in words.^[9]
• 1817 – to represent as if by painting.^[9]
• 1871 – of a picture, to represent.^[9]

Meanings

Verb

1. To show in a drawing, painting, sculpture or other image; to portray: The mural depicts the founding of the town.^[7][14][9]
2. To describe or represent in words: Her novel depicts life in a mining village.^[14][7][9]
3. To represent or portray by other means than drawing or painting, as in carving, weaving or film.^[7][9]

Word family

• depiction
• depicter
• depictive
• undepicted

Related words

• paint
• picture
• depaint

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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)
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 e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ a b 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 e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
14. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.