frankincense

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English frank-encens, also spelled fraunk encense,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French franc encens,^{[5][6][7][8][9]} from franc (“free; noble, true”) and encens (“incense”).^{[6][10][11][12]} The Middle English Dictionary also compares Medieval Latin francum incensum.^[2] The adjective, the source of frank, here probably meant "pure" or "of the highest quality", a sense that also existed in English.^[6][5][9][7] Weekley compared German Edelstein (“gem”), literally "noble stone".^[13] The Anglo-Norman noun, recorded from the early 12th century, already covered frankincense as well as incense in general.^[14]

Earliest recorded meaning

The aromatic resin burnt as incense: before 1398, as fraunk encense, in John Trevisa's translation of Bartholomew's De Proprietatibus Rerum ("And þis londe bereþ fraunk encense").^[2][11] The OED's first record is from before 1400, in Mirfield's Sinonoma Bartholomei, where it glosses olibanum;^[5][2] Etymonline dates the word to the late 14th century.^[6]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the word appears in medical texts such as Lanfranc's surgery, in a list of drying remedies for old wounds, as well as for the resin of worship.^[2] From 1577, in William Harrison's Description of England, it was also used of a similar resin from firs and pines, and of the tree itself;^[5][15] the King James Bible of 1611 has it for a tree.^[5] Johnson (1755) described it as a dry, pale yellowish, strongly smelling resin, and guessed that it was named for "its liberal distribution of odour".^[16] Merriam-Webster notes that it was valued in ancient times in worship and for embalming and fumigation, and is still an important incense resin.^[4]

Timeline

• before 1398 – fraunk encense, the aromatic resin, in Trevisa.^[2][11] The OED's first record is from before 1400.^[5]
• 1577 – a similar resin from firs or pines; also the tree.^[5][15]
• 1611 – a frankincense tree, in the King James Bible.^[5][15]

Meanings

Noun

1. An aromatic gum resin from trees of the genus Boswellia of Arabia and East Africa, burnt as incense; olibanum: The priest swung a censer of frankincense.^[4][12][5]
2. A similar resin obtained from firs or pines.^[5][17]

Related words

• incense
• frank
• olibanum
• myrrh

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f 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. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
4. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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 Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
11. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
12. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
13. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
15. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
17. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press