hamstring

Etymology

It is formed from English ham + string,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} ham in its older sense, the bend or hollow of the knee.^[5][3][7] Ham is from Old English hamm,^[5][8][6] from Proto-Germanic *hammō (“shin bone, hollow of the knee”),^[9] the source also of Old Norse hǫm, Middle Low German hamme and Old High German hamma.^[5][8][6] Etymonline traces it to Proto-Indo-European *knam- (“shin bone”).^[5] The verb, first recorded in 1641, is made from the noun.^[2][3][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

One of the tendons at the back of the human knee: 1565, in Arthur Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses.^[2][3] Merriam-Webster gives the same date,^[7] Etymonline the 1560s.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The tendon gave its name to the act of cutting it, which lames a person or animal.^[5] The verb appeared first in a figurative sense, to disable as if by cutting the hamstrings, in Milton's writings of 1641;^[2][3][7] the literal sense, to cut the hamstrings of, is recorded only from 1675,^[2] or the 1670s in Etymonline.^[5] It was also used of cutting the tendons in the small of a whale.^[2][7] The noun was extended to the great tendon at the back of the hock in a horse or other quadruped in 1688.^[2] Johnson (1755) gave the noun as the tendon of the ham, and the verb as to lame by cutting it.^[10] An older name for the same tendon was hough-sineuen, from hock and sinew, recorded in the 15th century.^[5]

Timeline

• 1565 – noun, a tendon at the back of the human knee.^[2][3][7]
• 1641 – verb, to disable or cripple, figuratively, in Milton.^[2][3][7]
• 1675 – verb, to lame by cutting the hamstrings.^[2] Etymonline dates the literal sense to the 1670s.^[5]
• 1688 – the great tendon at the back of the hock in quadrupeds.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. Any of the tendons at the back of the human knee.^[11][7][2]
2. Any of the three muscles at the back of the thigh that bend and rotate the leg: The striker pulled a hamstring in the second half.^[7]
3. The large tendon at the back of the hock in the hind leg of a horse or other quadruped.^[11][7][2]

Verb

1. To cripple a person or animal by cutting the hamstrings.^[11][7][2]
2. To make ineffective or powerless; to thwart: The new rules hamstrung the committee.^[11][7][2]

Related words

• ham
• string

Usage notes

The past tense and past participle are usually hamstrung;^[4][10] hamstringed is now rare.^[4] Etymonline cites Fowler's argument that, since the verb is made from the noun and not from the verb string, hamstringed is the logical form.^[5]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
10. ^ 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.
11. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins