intermission

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English intermissioun,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Latin intermissiō (“a breaking off, interruption”),^{[5][6][3][7][8]} perhaps also borrowed from Old French intermission,^[2][4][9] a French word that the OED cites from 1413.^[5] The Latin noun is formed from intermissus, the past participle of intermittō (“to leave off, leave an interval”),^[6][10][7] the source of intermit,^[11][8] from inter (“between”) and mittō (“to let go, send”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A stopping for a time, an interruption: before 1415, in Wycliffe's writings, according to Barnhart.^[3] The same quotation is in the Middle English Dictionary, which queries it as "an omission", and which has "a pause" from Lydgate about 1430.^[2] Etymonline dates the word to the early 15th century, as "fact of intermitting, temporary pause".^[6] The OED's first quotation, in an entry not fully revised, is from 1526.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The word first named the act of pausing, often in the phrase without intermission.^[2][5] In the later 16th century it also came to mean relief or respite from something, recorded from 1576, a sense now rare.^[5][9] From the 1560s it meant the time that passes between events.^[6][5][9] Johnson (1755) gave four senses, among them "intervenient time" and the space between the fits of a fever, a medical sense that Merriam-Webster still distinguishes from remission.^[12][10] In architecture Wotton used it in 1624 for a break in a wall.^[5] The sense that is now usual, the pause between the parts of a performance, is dated by Etymonline to 1854, first of plays and later of films,^[6] and by the Historical Thesaurus to 1927.^[13] The OED also has a rare intermission, mediation or interposition (1628 to 1670), which it derives from an obsolete verb intermit.^[5]

Timeline

• before 1415 – a temporary pause or interruption.^[3][2] The OED's first quotation is from 1526.^[5]
• c. 1566 – the time between events or periods of action.^[5][6]
• 1576 – relief or respite from something.^[5]
• 1624 – a break in a wall or similar structure.^[5]
• 1641 – an omission in a narrative (obsolete).^[5]
• 1854 – the pause in a performance of a play.^[6] The Historical Thesaurus dates this sense to 1927.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. An interval between the parts of a play, film or concert: We stretched our legs at intermission.^[8][10][9]
2. A period between events or activities; a pause: The rain fell for three days without intermission.^[8][10][9]
3. The act of intermitting, or the state of being intermitted.^[8][10]
4. (medicine) The time between two paroxysms of a disease.^[10][12]
5. (rare) Temporary rest or respite from something.^[5][9]

Related words

• intermit
• intermittent
• mission
• remission

Usage notes

Intermission is the usual American word for what British English calls an interval in a performance.^[6] Fowler (1926), quoted by Etymonline, disliked its spread in Britain: "it is beginning to infiltrate here and should be repelled; our own word does very well".^[6]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ 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
10. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ 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.
13. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)