fullness

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English fulnesse,^[2][3] formed from Middle English ful + -nesse, that is, full and -ness.^[2][4][5] The OED treats it as a word inherited from Germanic, cognate with or formed like Old High German folnassī (also folnissa), everything contained in something, totality.^[6] It records the word from Old English, where the related forms fyllnes, from fill, and gefyllednes were more frequent and often earlier in the same senses.^[6] Fyllnes is typical of Anglian texts and is formed like Middle Dutch vulnisse.^[6] Etymonline, by contrast, finds no such Old English word in the texts and dates the word to the mid-14th century, when it translated Latin saturitās and plēnitūdō.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the OED, all that is contained in something, especially the world, the heavens or the sea, from an Old English psalter, and completeness or perfection, from the Durham Ritual.^[6] Etymonline's first sense, from the mid-14th century, is the state of being sated or satisfied, and wholeness or totality.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The OED explains the biblical uses, especially the early ones, as ultimately modelled on a Hebrew word for the contents of something, through the Vulgate's use of Latin plēnitūdō;^[6] the 1989 edition of the OED called the sense "all that the world contains" a Hebraism.^[7] The phrase the fullness of time, the destined time, is also biblical, from Paul's letters: Etymonline dates it to about 1400,^[5] the 1989 edition of the OED to 1560.^[7] The sense of satiety follows about 1350, and that of being filled to capacity before 1398, in Trevisa; the figurative use of a heart filled with emotion is from 1533, in More.^[6] In the 15th century the word was used of the full moon, after Latin plēnilūnium, and in the Promptorium Parvulorum (1440) both of the richness of a sound or colour and of plenty, a sense now obsolete.^[6] From the late 16th century it described a feeling of pressure inside the body (1583) and a rounded, plump outline (1599), and since 1792 the ample cut of a garment, with dressmakers using it from 1800 for gathered fabric.^[6]

Timeline

• Old English – all that something contains, especially the world or the sea; completeness, perfection.^[6]
• c. 1350 – the state of being sated; satiety.^[6][5]
• before 1398 – the state of being filled to capacity.^[6]
• c. 1400 – the fullness of time.^[5]
• 1440 – richness or volume of a sound or colour; plenty, abundance (obsolete by 1723).^[6]
• before 1475 – of the moon, being full.^[6]
• 1533 – figuratively, of a heart filled with emotion.^[6]
• 1583 – a feeling of pressure or distension in the body.^[6]
• 1599 – roundness of outline, plumpness.^[6]
• 1792 – the ample cut of a garment.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. The quality or state of being full; completeness.^[2][6][1]
2. The state of being satisfied or sated after eating or drinking; satiety: a pleasant fullness after supper.^[6][4]
3. Richness or volume, as of a sound, colour or flavour: the fullness of the cello's lower notes.^[6][4]
4. A rounded outline; plumpness: the fullness of her cheeks.^[6][4]
5. Ample cut in a garment, or material gathered for it.^[6]
6. in the fullness of time: eventually, when the right time comes.^[2][7]

Word family

• fullness of time

Related words

• full
• fill

Usage notes

The 1898 first edition of the OED adopted the spelling fullness by analogy, although fulness was then commoner outside the United States.^[6] Fullness is now by far the more common spelling, though fulness is still frequent.^[6] Merriam-Webster gives fulness as the less common form.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
3. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
4. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press