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Etymology and origin of the English word gage

Pronunciation

  • /ɡeɪd͡ʒ/[1]

gage1 pledge, challenge

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
c. 1300 Kyng Alisaunder
Borrowed from
Old French gage via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Proto-Germanic *wadją

Etymology

The pledge is inherited from Middle English gage,[2][3] borrowed from Old French gage, also guage,[4][5][6][3] recorded from the 11th century in the senses pledge of battle, security, and pay.[5] It is of Germanic origin,[3][7][8] from Frankish *wadja-,[5][6] from Proto-Germanic *wadją (“pledge, surety”),[9][1][6] the source also of wed,[5][10][4] and the Old French variant wage gave wage.[4][10] Its cognates include Gothic 𐍅𐌰𐌳𐌹 (wadi, “pledge”),[3][6][9][11] Old Norse veð and Old High German wetti,[9] and Barnhart compares Latin vās (“a surety”), from Proto-Indo-European *wadh-.[6] The Italian gaggio, Spanish gage and Portuguese gage are loans from French.[5] The verb is borrowed from Middle French gager,[3][4][12] or an aphetic form of engage.[4][12][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

A pledge to do battle, a challenge: probably before 1300 in Kyng Alisaunder, according to Barnhart;[6] the OED dates the same text before 1400,[4] and Etymonline gives about 1300.[5]

Semantic evolution

The pledge of battle was usually a glove thrown on the ground for an opponent to take up.[4][3] The wider sense, something deposited as security and forfeited if a promise is not kept, is in the Middle English Dictionary from about 1390,[2] and the OED records phrases such as in gage and at gage from 1523.[4] The verb meant to deposit as security from about 1400,[5] to pledge or pawn in Caxton (1474)[4] and to stake or wager from about 1598;[4] Shakespeare used it in Hamlet for a moiety "gaged by our king".[13] Johnson (1755) defined the noun as a pledge, pawn or security, quoting Spenser.[14] Both noun and verb are now archaic,[8][3] though in West Yorkshire gage still meant to wager around 1900.[13]

Timeline

  • c. 1300 – a pledge to do battle, usually a glove thrown down; a challenge.[5][6][4]
  • c. 1390 – something deposited as security; a ransom or payment.[2]
  • c. 1400 – verb, to deposit as security.[5] The OED's first quotation for the verb is from 1474, in Caxton.[4]
  • 1562 – Scottish, in the plural: wages (obsolete).[4]
  • c. 1598 – verb, to stake or wager.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Something, such as a glove, thrown down as a pledge to fight; hence, a challenge.[3][7][8]
  2. (archaic) Something deposited as security; a pledge or pawn.[7][8][3]

Verb

  1. (archaic) To pledge or offer as security; to stake or wager.[7][8][3]

gage2 greengage plum

Confidence
Established
Formation
Clipping, Eponym
First attested
1847

Etymology

The plum is a shortening of greengage,[3][4][12][15] which is named after Sir William Gage (1657–1727),[16][12][5] the English botanist who introduced it to England,[16][12] about 1725.[5][11] The American Heritage Dictionary gives his dates as 1656?–1727,[7] while Merriam-Webster names a Sir William Gage who died in 1820 and says he imported the plum from France.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A greengage: 1847, according to Merriam-Webster;[3] Dictionary.com dates it 1840–50, and the OED's first quotation is from 1888.[17][4]

Semantic evolution

The full name greengage is recorded from 1718.[4][3] Weekley wrote that Gage, of Norfolk, popularized not only the plum the French call reine-claude, named after the wife of Francis I, but also the blue and purple gage, and that by his time the word was used only in greengage.[11]

Timeline

  • 1718 – greengage, the full name of the plum.[4][3]
  • 1847 – gage, short for greengage.[3] The OED's first quotation is from 1888.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A greengage or a related plum.[3][12][4]

Usage notes

Gage is also a spelling of gauge, especially in technical use;[17][10][12] the American Heritage Dictionary gives it a third entry, from Old North French, of Germanic origin.[7] Under this spelling the OED and the Shorter Oxford record a quart pot (about 1440) and a pipeful of tobacco (1676),[4][12] and American drug slang used gage for marijuana from 1934.[18][12] Weekley explains the nautical weather-gage as the same gauge.[11]

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c 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. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  7. ^ a b c d e f The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  8. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  9. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  10. ^ a b c d Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h i Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  13. ^ a b 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)
  14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  15. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
  16. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  17. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  18. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Gage.” Etymologically, 1 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/gage. Accessed 1 Nov. 2026.

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