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limb

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Pronunciation

limb1 arm, leg; branch

Etymology

The body part is inherited from Middle English lim,[2][3][4] inherited from Old English lim (“limb, part of the body, branch of a tree”),[5][6][2][7][8] inherited from Proto-Germanic *limuz.[6][2][9] It is cognate with Old Norse limr (“limb”) and lim (“small branch”),[5][6][9][10] and with Swedish lem and Danish lem.[5][11][10] Etymonline and Hoad take it as related to Old English liþ (“limb, joint”), Old Frisian lith, liðr and Gothic 𐌻𐌹𐌸𐌿𐍃 (liþus, “limb”),[6][12][13] and to German Glied (“limb, member”) and Dutch lid.[6][12][11] Kroonen compares Lithuanian liemuō (“log, trunk, body”),[9][5] and Barnhart (tentatively) and MW connect it with Latin līmes (“boundary”) and Latin līmen (“threshold”).[2][4] The final -b, which has long ceased to be pronounced, appears in the late 16th century, Barnhart's first record being 1547;[2][6][11] it is like the b of thumb,[11][2][14] perhaps under the influence of limb2 or of words such as comb and dumb.[2][6][14]

Earliest recorded meaning

A main branch of a tree, in Beowulf,[5] which Barnhart dates to about 725;[2] Old English also used it for any part of the body and for a limb distinct from the head and trunk.[5][7]

Semantic evolution

The broad sense "any organ or part of the body" is obsolete except in dialect,[5][8][4] and Etymonline quotes Caxton (1484) using it of the genitals.[6] From about 1400 limb was used for the leg, and in Victorian English this became a prudish substitute for that word.[5][6] The phrase life and limb is recorded from about 1200.[6][5] Old English already spoke of the devil's limbs,[12][5] and since 1625 limb alone has meant a mischievous person, later a naughty child.[5][12] Limb of the law, a lawyer or police officer, was 18th-century derisive slang (1730).[5][6][13] The idiom out on a limb, in a risky position with no support, is first recorded in 1897, from the image of someone at the end of a branch.[2][6][14] The verb, to tear limb from limb, dates from 1674,[5][4] and since 1835 it has also meant to cut the branches off a felled tree.[5]

Timeline

  • c. 725 – Old English lim, a main branch of a tree, in Beowulf.[5][2]
  • c. 1125 – Middle English lim, in the Peterborough Chronicle.[2]
  • c. 1200 – life and limb.[6]
  • c. 1400 – the leg.[5]
  • 1547 – spelling with -b.[2]
  • 1625 – a mischievous person or child.[5]
  • 1674 – verb, to dismember.[5][4]
  • 1730 – limb of the law.[5]
  • 1835 – verb, to cut the branches off a tree.[5]
  • 1897 – out on a limb.[2][6]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. An arm or leg of a person, or a similar part of an animal, such as a wing or fin.
  2. A large main branch of a tree.
  3. A projecting part or section of something larger; an extension.
  4. A member or agent of a larger body, as in a limb of the law.
  5. (chiefly British) A mischievous child.
  6. out on a limb: in a risky or isolated position, without support.

Verb

  1. To cut the branches off a felled tree.
  2. To tear limb from limb; to dismember.

Word family

  • limbless
  • limby
  • forelimb
  • hind limb
  • phantom limb

limb2 edge, border

Etymology

The edge is borrowed from Old French limbe and directly borrowed from Latin limbus (“hem, border, edge, fringe; the zodiac”).[2][5][3][8][15][12] Etymonline calls the Latin word of uncertain origin;[6] Klein relates it to limp and to Middle High German limpfen (“to limp”).[10] It is related to limbo.[5][12][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The graduated edge of a quadrant or other astronomical instrument: 1392, according to Barnhart,[2] or late 14th century in Etymonline;[6] the OED's first quotation for this sense is from 1593.[5]

Semantic evolution

In Scots from about 1450 to the late 18th century limb also meant limbo, the borderland of hell.[5][8][12] The astronomical sense, the edge of the disk of the sun, moon or another heavenly body, is recorded from before 1677, in Matthew Hale.[5][2][6] Newton used it for the edge of any surface (1704),[5] and since 1735 botanists have applied it to the broad blade of a petal, sepal or leaf.[5][8]

Timeline

  • 1392 – the graduated edge of an astronomical instrument.[2]
  • c. 1450 – Scots, limbo (obsolete by 1797).[5]
  • before 1677 – the edge of the disk of a heavenly body.[5][2]
  • 1704 – the edge or boundary of any surface.[5]
  • 1735 – botany, the blade of a petal or leaf.[5]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. (astronomy) The outer edge of the visible disk of the sun, the moon or a planet: the eastern limb of the moon.
  2. The graduated edge of an arc or circle in an instrument for measuring angles, such as a quadrant.
  3. (botany) The broad, flat part of a petal, sepal or leaf.

References

  1. ^ 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 q r Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  4. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  7. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  8. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  10. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  11. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  12. ^ a b c d e f g Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  13. ^ a b c Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  14. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  15. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press