incubation

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin incubātiō (“a lying upon eggs, brooding”),^[2][3][4][5] a noun of action from incubō (“to brood, hatch; to lie on”),^[2][3][4] which is formed from in- (“on”) and cubō (“to lie down”).^[3] The same Latin verb gave incubate and incubator.^[6][5] Johnson (1755) gave French incubation beside the Latin as its source.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Brooding, in a transferred and figurative sense, used especially of the Spirit of God moving over the waters of chaos at the Creation (Genesis 1:2): 1614, in Walter Raleigh's History of the World.^[2] Etymonline likewise dates the figurative sense "a brooding" to the 1610s,^[3] and Dictionary.com dates the word to 1605–15.^[8]

Semantic evolution

Although the Latin noun meant sitting on eggs, the literal sense is recorded in English only from 1646, in Sir Thomas Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica, a generation after the figurative one;^[2][3][9] Johnson (1755) defined the word simply as the act of sitting on eggs to hatch them.^[7] In the 19th century medicine took it up for the stage in which a disease develops in the body between infection and the first symptoms (1835);^[2] from 1871 it was also applied to the ancient Greek practice of sleeping in a temple or sacred place to receive oracles or dreams (in E. B. Tylor's Primitive Culture).^[2][9] In the 20th century it was extended to keeping cultures, eggs or other things in a controlled, artificial environment (1928),^[2][6] and it is also used for the stage of creative thought in which an idea is brooded over until it takes shape.^[9]

Timeline

• 1614 – brooding, figuratively, as of the Spirit over chaos.^[2][3]
• 1646 – the sitting on eggs to hatch them.^[2][9]
• 1835 – in pathology, the development of a disease between infection and the first symptoms.^[2]
• 1871 – in ancient Greek religion, sleeping in a temple to receive oracles.^[2]
• 1928 – incubating something in a controlled, artificial environment.^[2][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. The sitting on eggs by a bird or other animal so as to keep them warm until they hatch: The penguins share the incubation of a single egg.^[9][2][6]
2. The keeping of eggs, bacteria, cultures or other material at a controlled temperature so that they develop: After two days of incubation the sample showed no growth.^[9][2][6]
3. (medicine) The development of an infection in the body before any symptoms appear, or the time this takes; the incubation period.^[9][2][6]
4. The slow development of an idea or plan in the mind before it takes shape, considered as a stage of creative thought.^[9]
5. (history) The practice, in ancient Greece and elsewhere, of sleeping in a temple or sacred place in order to receive oracles or healing dreams.^[9][2]

Word family

• incubational
• incubation period

Related words

• incubate
• incubator
• incumbent
• cubicle

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ 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.
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster