epilogue

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English epiloge,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French epilogue,^[2][3][5] also recorded as epilogue in Middle French,^[6][7] from Latin epilogus,^[3][5][8] from Ancient Greek ἐπίλογος (epílogos, “conclusion of a speech, peroration”).^[8][3][5][9] Klein derives the Greek noun from ἐπιλέγω (epilégō, “to say in addition”),^[10][7] formed from ἐπί (epí, “upon, in addition”) and λέγω (légō, “to say, speak”);^[10] the OED and the American Heritage Dictionary instead analyse it as the same prefix and λόγος (lógos, “word, speech”).^[8][5] The Old French word is recorded from the 13th century.^[3] The OED dates the English word only from 1564, as a borrowing from French.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The concluding part of a literary work: first recorded about 1425 in the Middle English Chauliac, which speaks of putting something "vnder a manere epiloge",^[2] and then in Bokenham, before 1475.^[2] Barnhart likewise dates epilog to about 1425.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The word first named the closing part of a book, and the OED's record of that sense runs from 1564 to the present.^[8][2] The theatrical sense, a speech or short poem addressed to the audience by an actor after the play has ended, appears in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (1600),^[8] and Weekley and Etymonline call it the earliest sense in English,^[11][3] though the OED and the MED record the literary sense first.^[8][2] Johnson (1755) defined it only in this way, as "the poem or speech at the end of a play", quoting the epilogue of As You Like It.^[12] The Greek rhetorical sense, the peroration of a speech, was used in English in the 17th century (1644), as was the sense "a summary" (1646); both are obsolete.^[8] Figurative uses for any closing event go back to Quarles, before 1644.^[8] In British broadcasting an epilogue was formerly the last programme of the day.^[13]

Timeline

• c. 1425 – the concluding part of a literary work, as epiloge.^[2][6]
• 1596 – verb, to add an epilogue to something.^[8]
• 1600 – a speech or poem addressed to the audience at the end of a play.^[8]
• 1644 – the peroration of a speech, in rhetoric (now obsolete).^[8]
• 1646 – a summary (now obsolete).^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A closing section of a novel or other literary work, often telling what happened to the characters later; a postscript.^[13][7][8]
2. A speech, often in verse, addressed to the audience by an actor at the end of a play; also the actor who speaks it.^[13][8][7]
3. A closing event or episode that rounds off a series of happenings: The court case was a sad epilogue to the band's career.^[8][7]
4. (British, formerly) The last programme of a broadcasting day.^[13]

Verb

1. To supply with an epilogue.^[7][8]

Related words

• prologue
• epi-
• -logue
• logos
• legend
• lecture
• dialogue

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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 Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
5. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
7. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
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