gamete

Etymology

It is borrowed from German Gamet, used by Eduard Strasburger in 1877,^[2][3] from Ancient Greek γαμέτης (gamétēs, “husband”) or γαμετή (gametḗ, “wife”),^[2][4][5] from γαμέω (gaméō, “to marry”),^[2][6][3] from γάμος (gámos, “marriage”).^[7][5][4] The entry as revised in the OED in 2013 takes the word from German and treats gameta as a Latinized form of it;^[2] most other dictionaries derive the English word from New Latin gameta.^{[7][6][5][8][9]} Etymonline and the American Heritage Dictionary trace the Greek words to Proto-Indo-European *gem(e)- (“to marry”),^[3][7] also the source, according to Etymonline, of γαμβρός (gambrós, “son-in-law, father-in-law, brother-in-law”) and Latin gener (“son-in-law”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

One of the two reproductive cells that fuse to form a zygote: 1878, in the Journal of Botany, British and Foreign,^[2] the same year as the first date in Merriam-Webster Unabridged.^[5] Etymonline dates the English word to 1880,^[3] and Barnhart to 1886.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The word applied Greek terms for a husband and a wife to cells that unite in pairs.^[2][3] Etymonline credits the word to Strasburger and calls the widespread attribution to Mendel apparently mistaken.^[3] The Shorter Oxford also records the compound gamete intrafallopian transfer.^[8]

Timeline

• 1877 – German Gamet, in Strasburger's botanical paper.^[2]
• 1878 – a reproductive cell that fuses with another to form a zygote.^[2][5] Etymonline dates it to 1880,^[3] and Barnhart to 1886.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A mature germ cell, such as a sperm or ovum, usually haploid, that fuses with another in sexual reproduction to form a zygote.^[5][10][2]

Word family

• gametic
• gametically
• gametocyte
• gametogenesis
• gametal

Related words

• bigamy
• monogamy
• -gamy

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
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 Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
7. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins