dub

English has two main words spelled dub: the older one, to make a knight, came from French after the Norman Conquest, and the younger one, to add a soundtrack, is a shortening of double.^[1][2]

Pronunciation

• /dʌb/^[3]

dub¹ make a knight, name

Etymology

The verb meaning to make a knight is inherited from Middle English dubben, inherited from Old English dubbian, first recorded in the “Anglo-Saxon Chronicle” for 1085 in a phrase meaning "dubbed to knight".^[4][5][6][7] It is generally taken as borrowed from Anglo-Norman duber, a shortened form of aduber,^[8][6][1][9] Old French adober (“to equip with armour; to repair”), now adouber,^[8][6][5] which is recorded from the 11th century, in the “Chanson de Roland”.^[5][10] Hoad thinks the English phrase was modelled on the Anglo-Norman phrase for dubbing someone a knight.^[6] The Anglo-Norman verb, recorded from 1121–25, meant to equip, arm, clothe, adorn and repair, as well as to knight.^[11] The Old French word has relatives across Romance, such as Italian addobbare, Old Spanish adobar and Old Occitan adobar,^[5][4] and its further origin is unknown.^[5][8][12] Some trace it to Frankish *dubban (“to strike”),^[9][7][13] with reference to the blow on the shoulder,^[13] and Hoad and Klein call it Germanic;^[6][14] the OED and Barnhart reject this, since no such Germanic verb is found and the Icelandic and Swedish verbs for dubbing a knight are late borrowings from English or Romance.^[5][4] The OED also notes a difficulty with the English form, since a borrowing of the French word would be expected to begin with a-, a form found only from the 15th century.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

To make someone a knight: 1085, in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.^[5][4] Barnhart finds the Middle English form probably before 1200, in Layamon's chronicle.^[4]

Semantic evolution

From about 1330 the verb meant to give anyone a dignity or new title;^[5][4] from 1599 in Barnhart, 1607 in the OED, it meant to give a name or nickname, now the ordinary sense and often humorous or mocking.^[4][5] Word Origins sees this naming sense as growing out of the knighting ritual.^[2] A second branch kept the French sense of equipping or dressing: to dress or adorn (before 1300 to 1570),^[5] to dress an artificial fly for angling (before 1450),^[5][15] to cut the comb and wattles of a cock (1570), to trim trees and hedges (before 1661) and to dress cloth (1802).^[5] Smearing leather with grease gave the noun dubbin, a dressing of oil and tallow for leather, in the 18th century.^[1][6] Etymonline notes that in Middle English the sense of dressing up could extend to adulterating or counterfeiting.^[10] In northern English dialect the verb still meant to dress flies for fishing in the 19th century.^[15]

Timeline

• 1085 – to make a knight.^[5][4]
• before 1300 – to dress or adorn (obsolete by 1570).^[5]
• c. 1330 – to give a dignity or new title.^[5]
• before 1450 – to dress an angler's fly.^[5]
• 1570 – to cut the comb and wattles of a cock.^[5]
• 1599 – to give a name or nickname (1607 in the OED).^[4][5]
• 1802 – to dress cloth.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To make someone a knight by touching the shoulder with a sword: The queen dubbed the old soldier a knight.^[16][17][5]
2. To give a name, title or nickname to: Reporters dubbed the new stadium “the Bowl”.^[16][17]
3. To dress leather by rubbing in grease.^[16][8]
4. (angling) To dress an artificial fly.^[16][5]

Word family

• dubber
• dubbing
• dubbin

dub² add a soundtrack

Etymology

The soundtrack verb is a shortening of double,^{[5][4][10][8][1]} so called because it involves recording voices a second time, or doubling them, on the soundtrack.^[4][10] Merriam-Webster calls it a shortening and alteration of the same verb.^[17]

Earliest recorded meaning

To provide a film with a new soundtrack, or to add or alter its sound: 1929 in Barnhart and Etymonline,^[4][10] 1930 in the OED and Merriam-Webster, the OED's first quotation coming from the journal Electronics.^[5][17]

Semantic evolution

The verb soon covered adding sound effects or music to a film or broadcast and transferring recorded sound to a new recording or combining several soundtracks,^[17][8][5] and above all giving a film a soundtrack in another language.^[5][17] From remixing came the name of a genre of popular music, originally Jamaican, in which a recording, usually of reggae, is remixed with some or all of the vocals removed and effects such as echo added: 1973 in the OED, from the Daily Gleaner of Kingston, and 1974 in Etymonline and Merriam-Webster.^[5][10][17] By 1976 dub also named a kind of performance poetry with a reggae rhythm, in Jamaican English or Jamaican Creole.^[5][8]

Timeline

• 1929 – to add or alter sound on a film.^[4][10]
• 1930 – to give a film or broadcast an alternative soundtrack.^[5][17]
• 1973 – noun, a genre of remixed reggae music.^[5]
• 1976 – dub poetry.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To give a film or broadcast a new soundtrack, especially one with the dialogue translated into another language: The cartoon was dubbed into Spanish.^[17][5][8]
2. To add sound effects or music to a film, broadcast or recording.^[17][8]
3. To copy recorded sound onto a new recording, or to combine several soundtracks into one.^[17][8]

Noun

1. A style of popular music, originally Jamaican, in which a reggae recording is remixed with the vocals reduced or removed and effects such as echo added.^{[17][5][8][18]}
2. A kind of performance poetry delivered to a reggae rhythm.^[5][8]

Word family

• overdub
• redub
• dubstep

Related words

• double

Usage notes

Other words spelled dub are rarer: a muddy pool or puddle, chiefly Scottish and of uncertain origin (before 1513); a thrust or the beat of a drum, of imitative origin (1513 and 1572); in American slang, an unskilful or clumsy person (1887); and a small copper coin of India, borrowed from Telugu (1781).^[5][17][8]

References

1. ^ 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
2. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
11. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
12. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
14. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
15. ^ a b 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)
16. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
17. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
18. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com