Etymologically
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funeral

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈfjuː.nər.əl/[1]

Etymology

The noun is Middle English funerelles, borrowed from Middle French funérailles (“funeral rites”),[2][3][4] from Medieval Latin fūnerālia (“funeral rites”), the neuter plural of fūnerālis (“having to do with a funeral”),[5][2] from fūnus (“funeral, death, corpse”),[5][2][6] of uncertain origin,[5] perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *dheu- (“to die, disappear”).[5][2] The adjective is Old French funeral, from Late Latin fūnerālis.[4][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The adjective, relating to burial of the dead: about 1385, in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.[2][8] The noun, funeral rites: 1437, in the Proceedings of the Privy Council, as the plural funerelles.[2]

Semantic evolution

The singular and plural were used with the same sense until about 1700, and by the mid-17th century the spelling funeral was fixed.[5][2] Etymonline dates the singular noun to the 1510s, probably short for funeral service.[5] In Elizabethan English it was also a verb, “to mourn”.[5] The expenses of a funeral are from 1496 and obsolete.[8] A funeral sermon is from 1641, now only in the United States.[8] None of your funeral, no concern of yours, is from 1854, and it's your funeral is still informal.[8][9] Funereal is from 1725, in Pope's Odyssey.[2] The classical Latin adjective was funebris.[5]

Timeline

  • c. 1385 – the adjective.[2]
  • 1437 – funerelles, funeral rites.[2]
  • 1510s – the singular noun.[5]
  • 1725 – funereal.[2]
  • 1854 – none of your funeral.[8]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A ceremony at which a dead person is buried or cremated.
  2. A procession that goes with a body to the grave.
  3. (informal) Someone's own problem or concern: that's your funeral.

Adjective

  1. Of or used at a funeral: a funeral march.

Word family

  • funeralize
  • prefuneral
  • funeral director
  • funeral home
  • funeral pie
  • funerary
  • funereal

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 c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ a b c d e Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  9. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins