idea

Pronunciation

• IPA: UK /aɪˈdɪə/, US /aɪˈdiː.ə/^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English ydea, borrowed from Latin idea (“Platonic idea, archetype”),^[2][3] from Ancient Greek ἰδέα (idéa, “look, semblance, form; kind”),^[2][3][4] from ἰδεῖν (ideîn, “to see”),^[2][5][3] from Proto-Indo-European *weid- (“to see”).^[2][6] Cicero still wrote the word in Greek.^[2] Barnhart thinks Old French idee was probably also an influence.^[3] It is related to wit, vision, idol, idyll, history and kaleidoscope.^[4][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Platonic philosophy, an ideal form or archetype: before 1398, in Trevisa's translation of Bartholomew's De Proprietatibus Rerum.^[3] Etymonline also gives “the concept of a thing in the mind of God”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The Greek word first meant the look of a thing, and Plato made it the eternal pattern of which individual things are copies.^[4][2] In English, “something imagined or fancied” appears in Shakespeare's Love's Labour's Lost (1588), “a mental image recalled from memory” in 1589, and “a mental image” in general in 1612.^[3] The sense “a plan of something to be done” is also from the 1610s,^[2] and “any result of thinking” from about 1645.^[3][2] Descartes, Locke, Berkeley, Hume and Kant developed the philosophical sense further.^[2] The form idee, as in Dutch and German, survives in English dialects.^[2][8] Ideal is from the 17th century,^[7] idée fixe from 1836, and the colloquial big idea from 1908.^[2]

Timeline

• before 1398 – a Platonic archetype (Trevisa).^[3]
• 1588 – a fancy (Love's Labour's Lost).^[3]
• 1589 – an image recalled from memory.^[3]
• 1610s – a plan of action.^[2]
• 1612 – a mental image.^[3]
• c. 1645 – any result of thinking.^[3]
• 1836 – idée fixe.^[2]
• 1908 – big idea.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A thought or conception that exists in the mind as the product of mental activity.
2. An opinion, belief or principle.
3. A plan, scheme or method.
4. The gist or point of something: get the idea.
5. A vague notion or fancy.
6. A theme or motif.
7. (philosophy) In Plato, an eternal archetype of which things are imperfect copies.

Word family

• idealess
• ideamonger
• subidea
• fixed idea
• idea man

Related words

• ideal
• ideality
• ideate
• ideatum
• idealize
• idealist
• idealism
• ideology
• ideologue
• wit
• vision
• idol
• idyll
• history
• kaleidoscope

Usage notes

The American Heritage Dictionary groups idea with thought, notion, concept and conception, noting that idea has the widest range.^[9] In British English, the Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary notes a stress on the first syllable, /ˈaɪ.dɪə/, sometimes heard when a stressed syllable follows.^[1]

References

1. ^ a b 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 m n o Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
7. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin