lender

Etymology

It is formed from English lend + -er.^[2][3][4] Old English had an agent noun lǣnere (“creditor, lender”), from lǣnan (“to lend”) and -ere;^[2][5][6] the Old English verb comes from lǣn (“loan, gift”), the source of loan.^[2][7][4] Bosworth–Toller compares Old Frisian lēner and Old High German intlēhenari (“moneylender”).^[5] Middle English had lenere,^[8][9] and the form with -d-, lendare, glossing Latin fenerator and creditor, appears in the “Promptorium Parvulorum”.^[5] Merriam-Webster takes lender as that Old English word altered under the influence of lenden (“to lend”),^[6] while the OED regards the modern word as a new formation from lend.^[2] Etymonline leaves both possibilities open: a new formation, or the old word with a -d- taken from the verb.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

One who lends; in Old English lǣnere glossed Latin creditor in Ælfric's glossary.^[5][2] Etymonline dates the modern form to the mid 15th century.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The verb lend itself got its -d in Middle English from the past tense lende, on the analogy of verbs such as bend and send,^[4][2] and the agent noun followed it.^[4][6] From the start the word was often used of someone who lends money at interest:^[2] Middle English lener could mean a usurer,^[9] and Johnson (1755) gave as a second sense one who makes a trade of putting money to interest.^[10] From 1873, in Walter Bagehot's Lombard Street, it was used of an institution such as a bank,^[2] and the phrase lender of last resort names an institution that lends to borrowers who cannot get credit elsewhere.^[3]

Timeline

• Old English – lǣnere, creditor, lender.^[5][2]
• mid 15th century – lender, with -d- from the verb lend.^[4]
• 1755 – Johnson: one who lends; one who puts money out at interest.^[10]
• 1873 – an institution that lends money at interest.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person who lends something, especially one who lends money at interest as a business: The farmer could find no lender willing to wait for the harvest.^[6][2][10]
2. An institution, such as a bank or building society, that lends money at interest: mortgage lenders.^[2][3]
3. lender of last resort: an institution that lends to a borrower unable to get a loan elsewhere.^[3]

Word family

• moneylender

Related words

• lend
• loan

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
6. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ Stratmann, Francis Henry (1891), A Middle-English Dictionary, revised by Henry Bradley, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b Mayhew, A. L.; Skeat, Walter W. (1888), A Concise Dictionary of Middle English from A.D. 1150 to 1580, Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b c Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.