lifelong

Etymology

It was formed from English life + long in English.^[2][3][4][5] Its rare sense "throughout the whole day" comes from association with livelong.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Lasting a lifetime: 1613, in William Browne's Britannia's Pastorals,^[2] although Etymonline and Merriam-Webster date the word only to 1855,^[3][6] the Shorter Oxford to the early 19th century in this sense,^[4] and Dictionary.com to 1750–60.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The Shorter Oxford records the use as a synonym of livelong, from the mid-18th century, before the sense "lasting a lifetime",^[4] while in the OED the order is reversed: "lifelong" in 1613, and "livelong" from 1746, now rare.^[2] Coleridge used lifelong as a noun, meaning a lifetime, in 1814, a use that did not survive the 1850s.^[2] The adverb, for the whole of one's life, appears in Browning's The Ring and the Book (1868).^[2]

Timeline

• 1613 – lasting a lifetime.^[2]
• 1746 – the whole length of, livelong.^[2]
• 1814 – noun, a lifetime (obsolete).^[2]
• 1855 – adjective, in Etymonline and Merriam-Webster.^[3][6]
• 1868 – adverb, throughout life.^[2]

Modern meaning

Adjective

1. Lasting or continuing through the whole of a person's life: a lifelong passion for birdwatching.
2. Having been so for all of one's life: They were lifelong neighbours.

Related words

• lifetime
• livelong
• life
• long

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster