flagstaff

Etymology

It is a compound from English flag + staff.^[2][3][4][5] The flag is the cloth ensign, recorded from the late 15th century and of unknown origin;^[3] staff, a stick or pole, goes back to Old English stæf.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A pole or staff on which a flag is hung: 1614, in Overbury's Characters.^[2][6] Etymonline dates it to the 1610s, Merriam-Webster Unabridged to about 1613,^[3][7] and Dictionary.com to 1605–15.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The meaning has not changed.^[2][6] Johnson (1755) defined it as the staff on which a flag is fixed, quoting Dryden's Annus Mirabilis on bloody crosses rising on the duke's flagstaffs.^[4] The synonym flagpole is later, from 1782,^[3] and the American Heritage Dictionary now explains flagstaff by referring to it.^[8]

Timeline

• 1614 – a pole or staff on which a flag is hung.^[2][7][3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A pole or staff on which a flag is raised; a flagpole: The ship's ensign hung limp from the flagstaff.^[7][2][8]

Related words

• flag
• staff
• flagpole

Usage notes

The city of Flagstaff in Arizona is said to have been named after a celebration on 4 July 1876, when a large flag was flown from a tall tree;^[3] it was founded in 1876.^[8]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
7. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt