incision

Etymology

It is first recorded as inherited from Middle English inscicioun,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French incision^[3][5] and directly borrowed from Latin incīsiō (“a cutting into”),^[3][4][6] a noun of action from incīdō (“to cut into, cut open”),^[3][5][7][8] formed from in- (“into”) and caedō (“to cut”).^[3][8][2] Etymonline traces the Latin verb to Proto-Indo-European *kae-id- (“to strike”),^[3] and notes that the Latin noun is recorded only in figurative senses.^[3] The Oxford Dictionary of English gives the source as Late Latin.^[9] Barnhart explains the early medical spelling “inscicioun” as a blend with scissiō (“a cutting, tearing”), from scindō (“to split, tear”);^[2] the OED likewise ascribes the spelling with “insc-” of the 16th and 17th centuries to association with the Latin verb, as in scissors.^[5] According to Barnhart the form taken from French, recorded probably before 1422, then gradually replaced the older Middle English one as the word passed into common use.^[2] In Anglo-Norman incisiun is recorded from 1212, already for a cut made in surgery or for bleeding.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

A cut, a division made by cutting, especially in surgery: Barnhart dates inscicioun to 1392, in early medical manuscripts such as those of Lanfranc and Chauliac,^[2] and the OED's first quotation is from Lanfranc's Cirurgie, about 1400.^[5] Etymonline gives the late 14th century for "a cutting made in surgery".^[3]

Semantic evolution

The sense "the action of cutting into something", especially into the body in surgery, followed in the early 15th century in Etymonline^[3] and in 1474, in Caxton, in the OED.^[5] Johnson (1755) defined it as a wound made with a sharp instrument, "generally used for wounds made by a chirurgeon", with quotations from Shakespeare.^[11] From 1578 botanists and zoologists used it for a deep notch, as in the margin of a leaf or an insect's wing.^[5][4] In the 17th century it was often written for insition, grafting,^[5] and in medicine it once meant the loosening of thick humours (1626, Bacon), a sense now obsolete.^[5] A figurative sense, incisiveness or keenness, appears in Trollope in 1862,^[5] and Collins labels it rare.^[12] Geologists have used it since 1906 for a river cutting down its channel.^[5]

Timeline

• 1392 – inscicioun, a cut made in surgery.^[2] The OED's first quotation is from about 1400.^[5]
• 1474 – the action of cutting into something.^[5]
• 1578 – a deep notch in a leaf or insect's wing.^[5]
• 1601 – used for insition, grafting.^[5]
• 1626 – the loosening of viscid humours (obsolete).^[5]
• 1862 – figuratively, incisiveness.^[5]
• 1906 – the cutting down of a river's channel.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A cut made with a scalpel or knife into the body during a surgical operation: The surgeon closed the incision with six stitches.^[12][4][13]
2. The act of cutting into something; incising.^[12][5]
3. A cut, gash or notch.^[12][4][5]
4. In botany and zoology, a deep notch in the margin of a leaf or an insect's wing.^[12][4][5]
5. (rare) Incisiveness, keenness.^[12][5]
6. In geology, the cutting down and deepening of its channel by a river, or a channel so made.^[5]

Word family

• subincision

Related words

• incise
• incisive
• incisor
• scissors
• insition

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
13. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press