Etymologically
Log in

leak

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 16 October 2026 at 14:34. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /liːk/[1]

Etymology

The verb is Middle English lyken, leken, probably borrowed from Middle Dutch leken (“to drip, leak”) or from Old Norse leka,[2][3][4][5] both related to Old English leccan, to moisten, which did not survive into Middle English,[3][2] from Proto-Germanic *lek-, deficiency, a variant of the base of lack,[3][5] from PIE *leg-, to dribble, trickle.[3] Barnhart notes cognates outside Germanic in Old Irish legaim, I melt, and Welsh llaith, damp.[2] The noun, a hole through which liquid passes, is late 15th-century, from the verb or from Old Norse leki.[3][4][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

To lose liquid: before 1398, in Trevisa;[2] the late 14th century in Etymonline, where Johnson defined it as to let water in or out.[3]

Semantic evolution

The noun, a hole or crack in a vessel, is from 1487.[6] To urinate is from the 1590s, in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1,[3] and to take a leak is slang from 1934, in Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer.[3][6] The figurative sense, to come to be known in spite of concealment, dates from at least 1832, and the transitive, to disclose, from 1859.[3] In electricity a path of high resistance through which current escapes is from 1896,[6] and an improper or deliberate disclosure of information, for political purposes, from 1950.[3][6]

Timeline

  • before 1398 – to lose liquid.[2]
  • 1487 – a hole or crack.[6]
  • 1590s – to urinate.[3]
  • 1832 – to become known.[3]
  • 1950 – a disclosure of secrets.[6]

Modern meaning

Verb

  1. To let liquid, gas or light escape or enter through a hole or crack.
  2. To escape or pass through a hole or flaw.
  3. To disclose secret information without authority, or to become known in this way.

Noun

  1. A crack or hole through which something escapes or enters.
  2. An unauthorized or deliberate disclosure of confidential information.
  3. A loss of electric current through faulty insulation.
  4. (slang) An act of urinating: take a leak.

Word family

  • leaker
  • leakproof
  • leakless
  • leakage
  • leaky
  • nonleaking

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press