Etymologically
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family

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈfæm.əl.i/, /ˈfæm.ɪ.li/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English familie, borrowed from Latin familia (“the servants of a household; the household”),[2][3][4] a noun formed from famulus (“servant, slave”),[4][2][5] from Old Latin famul.[6] Barnhart compares Oscan famel (“servant”) and Ancient Greek θαμέες (thamées, “crowded”), and derives them from Proto-Indo-European *dhē- (“to put, place”);[7] Klein suggests famulus may mean “belonging to the house”, from a base meaning “house” as in Sanskrit धामन् (dhā́man, “seat, dwelling place”),[6][8] while Etymonline calls it of unknown origin.[4] Latin familia rarely meant “parents with their children”, for which domus was used.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The servants of a house; the household (in the late 14th or early 15th century).[9][10][4][5]

Semantic evolution

According to the Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins a person's family was at first their servants, then everyone living in one house, parents, children and servants, before the modern meaning settled in the later 15th century.[11] The sense “those descended from a common ancestor, a lineage” is recorded from 1474, and “parents and their children” from 1484 in the Historical Thesaurus,[10] though Etymonline dates the latter to the 1660s.[4] Trench, writing in 1859, regretted that the word had ceased to include the servants, quoting Jeremy Taylor's advice to extend the same care “to all of our family … as to our children”.[12] The sense “a group of related things” dates from 1598,[10] and the biological rank between genus and order from 1753.[4] Languages have been grouped in families since 1762.[10] In 18th-century cant the family meant the community of thieves;[13][10] the US sense “a unit of the Mafia” was popularized by the film The Godfather (1972).[11] In the family way, “pregnant”, earlier meant “in a domestic setting, informally”.[11][14] In South African English family without an article, meaning one's kinsfolk, is a calque of Afrikaans familie.[15]

Timeline

  • 1388 – the servants of a household.[10]
  • c. 1425 – familye, household.[5]
  • 1452 – a household of parents, children and servants.[10]
  • 1474 – a lineage.[10]
  • 1484 – parents and their children.[10]
  • 1598 – a group of related things.[10]
  • 1602 – as an adjective.[3][10]
  • 1725 – the family, thieves (cant).[13]
  • 1753 – a biological rank between genus and order.[4]
  • 1762 – a group of related languages.[10]
  • 1807 – family tree.[7]
  • 1930 – family planning.[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A group of parents and their children living together as a unit.
  2. A group of people related by blood or marriage; one's relatives.
  3. The children of a person or couple: we want a large family.
  4. All the descendants of a common ancestor; a lineage, especially a distinguished one.
  5. All the members of a household.
  6. A group of related things: a family of fonts.
  7. (biology) A taxonomic rank above genus and below order.
  8. (linguistics) The languages descended from a common ancestor.
  9. A local unit of an organized crime group such as the Mafia.

Adjective

  1. Of or relating to a family: a family farm.
  2. Suitable for both children and adults: family movies.

Word family

  • familyhood
  • familial
  • familiar
  • familiarity
  • famulus
  • domestic

Usage notes

Random House treats family as a collective noun,[16] and the Concise Oxford notes that it may take a singular or a plural verb.[17] Black's Law Dictionary defines a family as persons connected by blood, affinity or law, or as a group living together with a shared commitment to a domestic relationship.[18]

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  3. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  7. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  8. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  9. ^ Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
  11. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  12. ^ Trench, Richard Chenevix (1859), A Select Glossary of English Words Used Formerly in Senses Different from Their Present, London: John W. Parker
  13. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  14. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  15. ^ A Dictionary of South African English on Historical Principles, Dictionary Unit for South African English, https://dsae.co.za
  16. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
  17. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  18. ^ Garner, Bryan A., ed. (2004), Black's Law Dictionary, 8th ed., St. Paul, Minn.: Thomson West