Etymologically
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gas

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ɡæs/[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Dutch gas, a word coined by the Flemish chemist Jan Baptista van Helmont (1577–1644),[2][3][4] probably an alteration of Ancient Greek χάος (kháos, “empty space, chaos”),[2][5][3] since Dutch g sounds roughly like Greek ch.[5][4] Van Helmont was probably influenced by Paracelsus, who used kháos in an occult sense, “proper element of spirits”.[5][2] Van Helmont wrote: “Hunc spiritum, incognitum hactenus, novo nomine gas voco” (“This vapour, hitherto unknown, I call by a new name, gas”).[5] The sense “petrol”, American English by 1905, is a clipping of gasoline.[5][6][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Van Helmont's occult principle supposed to be present in all bodies: 1658,[2][6] or the 1650s.[5]

Semantic evolution

Van Helmont was the first to realize that there were gases other than air,[4] but the word did not catch on until much later.[4] The modern scientific sense, any substance that expands without limit, like air, began in 1779.[2][5][6] It was then specialized to a combustible mixture used for fuel and light, coal gas, from 1794,[5][2] an anaesthetic, nitrous oxide, from 1894,[5][6] and poison gas in war from 1900.[5][2] Intestinal gas is from 1882.[5][6] Weekley wrote that the success of this artificial word is unique.[5] Slang “empty talk” is from 1847, and “something exciting or excellent” from 1953;[5] in Anglo-Irish gas also meant “fun, a joke”, used by Joyce in 1914.[5] The verb meant “to supply with gas” in 1886, and “to poison with gas” from 1889, as a military attack from 1915.[5] Gas pedal is by 1908 and gas station from 1916.[5]

Timeline

  • 1658 – an occult principle (van Helmont).[2]
  • 1779 – the modern scientific sense.[2]
  • 1794 – coal gas.[2]
  • 1847 – empty talk (slang).[5]
  • 1882 – intestinal gas.[5]
  • 1889 – verb, to poison with gas.[5][2]
  • 1894 – an anaesthetic gas.[5]
  • 1900 – poison gas.[2]
  • 1905 – petrol (US).[5][6]
  • 1916 – gas station.[5]
  • 1953 – something exciting (slang).[5]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A substance, like air, that has no fixed shape or volume and expands to fill any container.
  2. A gas or mixture of gases burned as fuel.
  3. (North America) Gasoline, petrol.
  4. A gas used as an anaesthetic, or as a poison in war.
  5. Gas in the stomach or intestines; flatulence.
  6. (slang) Empty talk; something very enjoyable.

Verb

  1. To kill or harm with poison gas.
  2. (North America) To fill a car with petrol.
  3. (informal) To talk idly.

Word family

  • gasless
  • avgas
  • gas-guzzler
  • gasohol
  • gas oil
  • gas pedal
  • gas station
  • gas tank
  • chaos
  • gasoline
  • gaseous
  • gasify
  • gasometer

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 l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  4. ^ a b c d Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press