elude

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin ēlūdō (“to finish play, win at play; to parry a blow, escape from; to make a fool of, frustrate”),^[2][3][4][5] formed from ē-, a variant of ex- (“out, away”),^[4][6][5] and lūdō (“to play”).^[2][3][7] The American Heritage Dictionary derives the verb from lūdus (“play”),^[5] and that family goes back to Proto-Indo-European *leid-.^[5] Klein compares allude and delude.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

To fool or delude: 1538 in Barnhart,^[4] the 1530s in Etymonline,^[3] and 1530–40 in Dictionary.com.^[9] The OED's and Merriam-Webster Unabridged's earliest date for this sense is 1594, in W. West's Symbolæography.^[2][10]

Semantic evolution

The Latin verb's sense of mockery came first in English, partly confused with illude,^[2] and it had faded by the early 18th century, along with "to baffle, disappoint".^[11][10] The sense of evasion began with arguments, in T. Taylor (1612),^[2][4] and spread to blows and dangers by the 1630s.^[2][3] In 1651 Hobbes used it of evading a law or obligation,^[2] and in Paradise Lost (1667) Milton used it of slipping from a grasp or pursuit, the more general sense.^[2][4] Johnson (1755) defined it as escaping by stratagem, and also gave "to mock by an unexpected escape", quoting Pope.^[12] The modern use with a thing as subject, failing to be noticed or explained, is recorded from 1816, in a note by Malone to Boswell's Life of Johnson.^[2][11]

Timeline

• 1538 – to fool, delude.^[4] The OED's first record is from 1594.^[2]
• 1612 – to evade the force of an argument.^[2][4]
• 1630s – to escape a blow, attack or danger by skill.^[2][3]
• 1651 – to evade a law or obligation.^[2]
• 1667 – to slip away from a grasp or pursuit.^[2][4]
• 1694 – to baffle, disappoint (obsolete).^[2]
• 1816 – of a thing, to remain undiscovered or unexplained.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To get away from or dodge someone or something, especially through cleverness: The fox eluded the hounds all morning.^[13][10][11]
2. To get out of a duty or get round a law; to evade it.^[13][10][2]
3. To go unnoticed by someone, or be too hard for them to grasp: The answer eluded the whole class.^[13][10][11]
4. (obsolete, 1594–1600) To deceive or delude.^[2][10][11]
5. (obsolete) To baffle or frustrate.^[2][10][11]

Word family

• eluder

Related words

• allude
• delude
• illude
• elusive
• elusion
• ludicrous
• illusion

Usage notes

Elude is sometimes wrongly used for allude: Collins's example of the correct use has someone alluding, not eluding, to an earlier visit.^[13]

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 m n o p q r s Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
10. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins