Etymologically
Log in

dredge

History Permalink

Etymology and origin of the English word dredge

Pronunciation

  • /dɹɛd͡ʒ/[1]

dredge1 sweetmeat, mixed grain; to sprinkle with flour

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
c. 1350
Borrowed from
Old French dragie via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Ancient Greek τράγημα

Etymology

The word for the sweetmeat, from which the verb "to sprinkle" comes, is inherited from Middle English dragge, also drage, dragie and dregge,[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French dragie, also dragee, modern French dragée.[3][5][6] The Anglo-Norman word is recorded from 1210–11 for a spice or sweetmeat and a sweet medicine for the stomach.[7] The OED notes the related Spanish dragea, Italian treggea and Medieval Latin drageia, all supposed to derive in some way from Latin tragēmata (“sweetmeats”),[3][8] from the plural of Ancient Greek τράγημα (trágēma, “sweetmeat, dried fruit”).[5][8][6] Barnhart traces the Greek noun to a verb meaning "to gnaw, nibble".[4] The verb is apparently formed from the noun,[3][9][10] and the modern French descendant gave English dragée in the 19th century.[10] For the noun meaning mixed grain, Merriam-Webster Unabridged and Klein give another source, Middle French dragie (“mixed grain grown for fodder”), from Vulgar Latin *dravocāta, from Gaulish dravoca (“darnel”).[8][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

A sweet or comfit containing a seed or grain of spice, or a mixture of spices: c. 1350, in a medical manuscript.[3] The Middle English Dictionary has the word earlier in Latin account rolls of Durham, from about 1333.[2] Barnhart dates it to about 1250.[4]

Semantic evolution

Middle English cookery strewed the spice mixture over food: a recipe of about 1425 says to "floresh the dysshes wyth drage", and one of about 1450 makes a dregge of powdered ginger, sugar, cinnamon, cloves and mace to cast over a dish.[2] The word could also mean a sweet medicine, and figuratively a reward or bribe.[2] From about 1440 it was also used for a mixture of grains sown together, especially oats and barley,[3] a sense that Weekley finds in French dragée too, in Cotgrave.[6] The sweetmeat sense died out after 1601, and the grain sense survives in dialect:[3] the English Dialect Dictionary records it from Staffordshire and Norfolk to Devon and Cornwall.[11] The verb, first recorded in Nashe in 1596, meant to sprinkle something with a powdered mixture of sugar and spices, and then with flour;[3][9] from 1648, in Herrick, it also meant to scatter a powder over something.[3] In mining, from 1874, dredge was ore of middling quality.[3] A flour box with a pierced lid was a dredge or dredger in Scotland, the Isle of Wight and Somerset.[11]

Timeline

  • c. 1350 – a sweetmeat or comfit containing spice; a mixture of spices (obsolete after 1601).[3]
  • c. 1440 – a mixture of grains, especially oats and barley, sown together (now dialect).[3]
  • 1596 – verb, to sprinkle with a powder, at first a mixture of sugar and spices, later flour.[3][8]
  • 1648 – verb, to scatter a powdered substance over something.[3]
  • 1874 – in mining, ore of middling quality.[3]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To sprinkle or coat food with a powder such as flour or sugar: Dredge the chicken pieces with seasoned flour before frying them.[8][12][3]
  2. To scatter a powdered substance over something.[3][9]

Noun

  1. (dialect) A mixture of grains, such as oats and barley, sown together.[8][3]
  2. A box with holes in the lid for sprinkling flour or sugar.[8][11]
  3. (obsolete, 1350–1601) A sweetmeat or comfit containing spice.[3][9]

dredge2 dragging net or machine; to clear with it

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Derivation
First attested
1471 the Scots compound dreg-boat
Ultimate origin
Old English dragan
Etymology tree of dredge2
inherited borrowed derived
English drag
English dredge

Etymology

The word for the dragging net or machine is probably from English a derivative of the stem of drag,[3][4][5] and its forms point to an unrecorded Old English *dręcg or *dręcge.[3][13] Merriam-Webster Unabridged takes it as perhaps an irregular formation from the root of dragan (“to pull”).[8] The Scots form dreg is found about 1500, and in the compound dreg-boat in 1471; the English spelling first appears in the verb, in 1576.[3] The noun corresponds to Dutch dreg, earlier Middle Dutch dregghe (“drag-net, grappling hook”),[3][9][10] Low German dregge and French dreige (1584), which the OED thinks may come from English.[3] The Shorter Oxford notes that the final consonant of the English word suggests a native origin,[9][14] and Ayto that if the English and Dutch words are connected, it is not clear which language borrowed from which.[10] The verb is formed from the noun.[3][4][15]

Earliest recorded meaning

An instrument dragged along the bed of a river or the sea to gather and bring up objects: 1471, in the Scots compound dreg-boat, a boat for dredging.[3][4][15] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the noun to 1602.[8] The verb, to bring up oysters and the like with a dredge, follows in 1508, in Kennedy's part of the Flyting with Dunbar.[3][4][8]

Semantic evolution

Johnson (1755) knew the noun as a net for oysters, fastened to iron bars and drawn at a boat's stern.[16] The verb was used intransitively, of working with a dredge, from 1681; from 1844 it was used of clearing the bed of a river, channel or harbour.[3] The machines that do this, with buckets, grabs or suction, are also called dredges or dredgers.[12][8] Figuratively the verb, often with up, means to bring something to light by deep searching.[8][9][15] In Lincolnshire, Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire and Dorset a dredge was a bush-harrow, a bundle of thorn bushes dragged over meadows.[11]

Timeline

  • 1471 – Scots dreg-, in dreg-boat, a boat for dredging.[3][4]
  • 1508 – verb, to bring up oysters or other objects from the bottom with a dredge.[3][4][8]
  • 1576 – the English spelling, in the verb.[3]
  • 1681 – verb, intransitive, to work with a dredge.[3]
  • 1844 – verb, to clear the bed of a river, channel or harbour.[3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A machine with buckets, a grab or suction that removes mud and silt from the bed of a river, harbour or channel.[12][8][3]
  2. A net on an iron frame, dragged along the bottom to gather oysters, fish or specimens.[8][3][16]

Verb

  1. To clear mud or silt from the bed of a river, harbour or channel with a dredge.[12][8][3]
  2. To bring up or gather something with a dredge.[8][3]
  3. To search for something under water with a dredge; to drag.[12]
  4. dredge up: to bring something forgotten or unpleasant to light: The inquiry dredged up an old scandal.[8][9][15]

Word family

  • dredger
  • undredged

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d 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 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 35 36 37 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  6. ^ a b c Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  7. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h 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 Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  11. ^ a b c d 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)
  12. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  13. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  14. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  15. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  16. ^ 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.

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Dredge.” Etymologically, 8 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/dredge. Accessed 9 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·