horticulture

Etymology

It is formed from English horti- + culture after agriculture,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} from Latin hortus (“garden”),^[3][4][7][8] perhaps as a Latin type New Latin *horticultūra (“cultivation of a garden”), from hortus and cultūra (“cultivation”).^[2][9] Merriam-Webster analyses it as hortus with an English connecting -i- and culture.^[10] The Latin noun originally meant an enclosed place;^[9] it is cognate with Ancient Greek χόρτος (khórtos, “enclosed place, farmyard”) and Irish gort (“crop”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰortos,^[4][9] from the root *gher- (“to grasp, enclose”),^[3][11][4] the source also of English yard.^[12][10] French horticulture was admitted by the Académie française in 1835.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The cultivation of a garden; the art or science of managing gardens: 1678, in the new edition of Edward Phillips's dictionary The New World of Words.^[2][4] Etymonline dates it to the 1670s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its meaning, the growing of flowers, fruit and vegetables.^[2] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as the art of cultivating gardens; he took it from the Latin words for garden and cultivation.^[13] Modern dictionaries extend it to orchards and nurseries, and to growing ornamental plants on any scale.^[10] Derivatives followed: horticulturist is recorded from 1818^[4] and horticultural from the late 18th century.^[5] Etymonline notes that Dorothy Parker famously punned on the word.^[3]

Timeline

• 1678 – the cultivation of a garden; the art of gardening.^[2][4][10]
• 1755 – Johnson defines it as the art of cultivating gardens.^[13]
• late 18th century – the adjective horticultural.^[5]
• 1818 – horticulturist.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. The art or science of growing fruit, vegetables, flowers or ornamental plants: He studied horticulture before opening a nursery.^[10][6][2]
2. The cultivation of a garden, orchard or nursery.^[10][2]

Word family

• horticultural
• horticulturally
• horticulturist

Related words

• agriculture
• culture
• cohort
• court
• garden
• yard
• floriculture

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
9. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
12. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ 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.