expend

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English expenden,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Latin expendō (“to weigh out, pay out”),^[5][6][7] from ex- (“out”) and pendō (“to weigh, pay”),^[5][3][4] which is related to pendeō (“to hang”),^[8] from Proto-Indo-European *(s)pen- (“to draw, stretch, spin”).^[6][3] Etymonline compares pound for the financial sense of the Latin verb.^[6] The word is a doublet of spend,^[7][9] which is the earlier of the pair in English.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

To pay out: about 1413 in Barnhart,^[7] early 15th century in Etymonline.^[6] The MED's first quotation, of 1439, is from a will, of rents and profits to be spent in carrying it out.^[2] The OED's first record, of about 1440, in the Gesta Romanorum, is already figurative.^[5]

Semantic evolution

From the start the word was used of resources in general as well as of money: the MED has it for exhausting one's means and for applying funds to a purpose, and the OED for laying out blood, care, labour and time.^[2][5] A sense "to spend, consume in outlay" lasted from 1477 to 1627, while "to lay out for a particular object", now the usual money sense, dates from 1484.^[5] Johnson (1755) gave only "to lay out; to spend", quoting Henry VI for the spending of a life.^[11] The sense "to use up material or force" followed in 1745, and in 1801, in a letter of Nelson, the naval sense of losing spars or masts in action or by storm.^[5] The Latin sense of weighing also came across for a time: following the Latin phrase expendere secum, the English verb meant to weigh mentally from 1531, in Elyot, to 1676.^[5] The derivatives expenditure (1769, in Burke) and expendable (1805) were formed later.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 1413 – to pay out.^[7]
• c. 1440 – figuratively, to lay out blood, care or labour.^[5]
• 1477 – to spend, consume in outlay (obsolete by 1627).^[5]
• 1484 – to lay out money for a particular object.^[5]
• 1531 – to weigh mentally, consider (obsolete by 1676).^[5]
• 1745 – to use up material or force.^[5]
• 1801 – at sea, to lose spars or masts.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To spend or pay out money: The council expended its whole budget on the bridge.^[12][4][5]
2. To devote time, care or effort to something: She expended much thought on the design.^[13][5]
3. To use up; to consume: The runners expended most of their energy in the first lap.^[12][4][5]
4. (nautical) To lose spars or masts in action or by storm; to use up spare rope by winding it round a spar.^[5][13]
5. To spend money, without an object.^[4]
6. (obsolete, 1531–1676) To weigh mentally; to consider.^[5][13]

Word family

• expender
• expendable

Related words

• expenditure
• expense
• expensive
• spend
• dispend
• pendant
• pound
• expand

Usage notes

The OED notes that the verb is less colloquial than spend and that in modern use it implies a definite direction or object of the outlay.^[5] Dictionary.com lists expand as a word it can be confused with.^[14]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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 The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ 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
6. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
8. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
13. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
14. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House