glossary

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English glosarie,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Latin glōssārium (“a collection of glosses”),^[5][6][2][7] from glōssa (“an obsolete or foreign word needing explanation”) and the suffix -ārium.^[6][8][7][5] Merriam-Webster calls the Latin word Medieval Latin and Collins Late Latin.^[8][9] Barnhart, Etymonline and Dictionary.com trace it to a Greek diminutive of the same noun, which Barnhart calls contemptuous.^[4][6][10] Dictionary.com explains that it first meant a difficult word needing explanation and was later taken as a collection of such words, the suffix being read as the Latin one.^[10] The Latin noun is from Ancient Greek γλῶσσα (glôssa, “tongue, speech, language”), Attic γλῶττα (glôtta).^[11][12] The OED compares French glossaire.^[5] The word belongs with gloss in the sense of an explanation.^[6][7][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

A book of glosses, probably one of the large glossaries of the Middle Ages: before 1380, in the Middle English legend of St Paula, "As seiþ þe bok iclept Glosarie".^[5][2] Barnhart dates it to probably about 1350,^[4] Etymonline to the mid-14th century.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The first glossaries were collections of the explanatory notes written on difficult words in texts, and the word kept that meaning while it widened to any list of hard, old, dialect or technical words with their explanations, a partial dictionary.^[5][13] Johnson (1755) defined it as "a dictionary of obscure or antiquated words".^[14] Today it is usually an alphabetical list of the terms of one subject, often printed at the end of a book.^[9][13][8] The OED also records a short-lived noun glossary meaning a glossator, once, in about 1706.^[5]

Timeline

• before 1380 – a book of glosses.^[5][2]
• 1715 – attributive use.^[5]
• 1755 – in Johnson, a dictionary of obscure or antiquated words.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. An alphabetical list of the terms of a particular subject or text with their definitions, often at the end of a book: The manual ends with a glossary of networking terms.^[9][8][13]
2. A collection of glosses on a text.^[8][5]
3. A list explaining the words of a dialect or other special usage.^[8][5]

Word family

• glossarial
• glossarist
• glossarially

Related words

• glossator
• glossology
• gloze
• gloss

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
10. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
13. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
14. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.