furrow

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English furwe, also forowe and forgh,^[2][3] inherited from Old English furh (“furrow, trench made by a plough”),^[2][4][5][6] from Proto-Germanic *furhs.^[1][7] Its Germanic cognates include Old Frisian furch, Middle Dutch vore, Dutch voor, Old High German furuh, German Furche and Old Norse for (“furrow, drainage ditch”).^[2][8][5][6] Outside Germanic it is related to Latin porca (“ridge between two furrows”), Welsh rhych (“furrow”) and Old Irish -rech,^[2][5][9] and Klein adds Old Breton rec (“I plough”).^[9] Etymonline, following Watkins, traces the group to Proto-Indo-European *perk- (“to dig, tear out”).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A narrow trench cut in the ground by a plough, especially to receive seed: in Old English, first in King Alfred's translation of Boethius.^[6] Bosworth–Toller glosses the Old English word with Latin sulcus.^[4] Barnhart dates the Old English word to before 800 and the Middle English form furg to before 1250.^[8]

Semantic evolution

From the trench left by a plough the word widened in Middle English to a trench or drain (c. 1330)^[6] and to anything resembling a furrow, such as a rut, groove or narrow hollow, already in Chaucer's translation of Boethius (c. 1374).^[6] Etymonline dates the general meaning "narrow trench or channel" to the early 14th century.^[2] Poets used it loosely for ploughed land or the cornfields (c. 1380); from the Wycliffite Bible on, it was also used figuratively of the track of a ship through the sea.^[6] A deep wrinkle on the face is a furrow from 1589 in the OED, the 1580s in Etymonline.^[6][2] The verb, formed from the noun, first meant to cut through water (c. 1425) and then to plough land (1576);^[6][2] Shakespeare used it of wrinkling the face in 1597.^[6] Old English already had its own verb, furian.^[2] Johnson (1755) defined the noun as a small trench made by the plough for the reception of seed.^[10] Later technical uses include the grooves cut in a millstone (1825) and an anatomical groove, the equivalent of Latin sulcus (1819).^[6] In Gloucestershire dialect to gold a furrow meant to keep to a furrow,^[11] and slang has used the word for the vagina since the early 17th century.^[12]

Timeline

• before 800 – furh, a trench made by a plough.^[8][6][4]
• c. 1300 – a measure of land the length or breadth of a furrow (obsolete by 1488).^[6]
• c. 1330 – a trench or drain.^[6]
• c. 1374 – a groove, rut or narrow depression, in Chaucer.^[6]
• c. 1425 – verb, to cut through water like a plough.^[6][2]
• 1576 – verb, to make furrows in land; to plough.^[6]
• 1589 – a deep wrinkle on the face.^[6][2]
• 1597 – verb, to wrinkle the face or brow.^[6][2]
• 1825 – one of the grooves in the face of a millstone.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A long narrow trench cut in the ground by a plough: The seed was dropped into the furrows.^[13][3][6]
2. Any long narrow groove, track or rut: Tractor wheels had left deep furrows in the mud.^[13][6]
3. A deep wrinkle, especially on the forehead.^[13][6]

Verb

1. To make furrows in land; to plough.^[13][3][6]
2. To wrinkle, or to become wrinkled: His brow furrowed as he read the letter.^[13][6]
3. To cut through water, leaving a track behind.^[6][14]

Word family

• furrower
• furrowless
• furrowlike
• furrowy
• unfurrowed

Related words

• furlong
• porcate

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
5. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
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 y Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
8. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
12. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
13. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
14. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press