emmet

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English emete,^[2][3][4] inherited from Old English ǣmete, also ǣmette and ǣmytte, meaning "ant".^[5][6][1] It is a doublet of ant.^[7][1] According to the OED, the non-West Saxon form ēmette was shortened to a Middle English form with a short first vowel, giving emmet, while West Saxon ǣmette was shortened to ămete, giving ant; for a time the two forms were used side by side in the early modern standard, until ant won out.^[8][9][10] The Old English word is from Proto-West Germanic *āmaitijā (“ant”),^[1] formed from Proto-Germanic *ē- (“off, away”) and Proto-Germanic *maitaną (“to cut”),^[1][9][11] and is related to Old High German āmeiza, German Ameise, Middle Dutch amete and Middle Low German āmete.^[8][9][4] The verb is the same as Gothic 𐌼𐌰𐌹𐍄𐌰𐌽 (maitan, “to cut, hew”), Old Norse meita and Old High German meizan.^[8][4][12] Etymonline and Ayto take the insect's name to mean "the biter-off",^[13][10] while the OED thinks it more probably refers to its visibly segmented body.^[8] Wiktionary traces the verb to Proto-Indo-European *meh₂y- (“to cut”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

An ant: early Old English, in glosses to the Proverbs of Solomon.^[8] Bosworth–Toller glosses the word with Latin formīca, and Old English medical texts prescribe emmets' eggs.^[5] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates it to before the 12th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word kept its meaning but lost ground to ant, and is now poetic, archaic or dialectal.^[8][3][12] Johnson (1755) still entered it as "an ant; a pismire".^[14] The English Dialect Dictionary found it in general dialect use in Scotland, Ireland and England, in forms such as emmock and yammet.^[15] In Cornwall it is recorded from 1975 for a tourist or holidaymaker, usually in the plural and with reference to summer crowds, compared by the OED with grockle.^[8][6][12]

Timeline

• Old English – an ant.^[8][5]
• 1975 – in Cornwall, a tourist or holidaymaker.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. (archaic or dialect) An ant.^[12][3][8]
2. (Cornwall, disparaging or humorous) A tourist or holidaymaker, especially one of the summer crowds: The beach car park was packed with emmets by ten o'clock.^[12][8][6]

Related words

• ant
• pismire
• grockle

Usage notes

The English Dialect Dictionary notes that in Wiltshire ant was never used, and records forms such as ammut in Kent and Sussex, emmock in Lothian and Roxburghshire, and yammet in Somerset and Devon.^[15]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
3. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
6. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
11. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
12. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
13. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
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)