links

Pronunciation

• IPA: /lɪŋks/^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Scots links (“sandy, rolling ground near the seashore”),^[2][3] inherited from Old English hlincas, plural of hlinc (“rising ground, ridge, bank”),^[3][4][5] perhaps from the same Germanic root as lean “to incline”,^[2][4][6] or cognate with Old High German hlanca “side, flank”, as Barnhart and Merriam-Webster suggest.^[3][5] It is unconnected with the singular link, from Old Norse.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old English hlinc, rising ground, is from 931.^[3] Undulating sandy ground on the seashore is from the 15th century in Hoad and Merriam-Webster,^[4][5] and Scottish and Northumbrian links from 1702 in Barnhart.^[3]

Semantic evolution

It was the Scottish word for the kind of landscape in which golf was born,^[2] the gently undulating turf-covered sand near the shore,^[7] and it has been part of the names of golf courses since at least 1728,^[2] when Barnhart and Etymonline record the golfing sense.^[3] Hoad dates the golf course to the 18th century.^[4] The southern form of the word was Middle English linch, “rising ground, especially between ploughed fields”, which lived on in dialect.^[2] In Northamptonshire dialect links was a tract of heather.^[8]

Timeline

• 931 – Old English hlinc, a ridge.^[3]
• 15th century – sandy ground by the sea.^[4][5]
• 1702 – Scottish links.^[3]
• 1728 – a golf course.^[3][2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A golf course, especially one by the sea.
2. (chiefly Scottish) Undulating sandy ground covered with turf near the seashore.

Word family

• linksland
• linksman

Related words

• link
• lean
• lynchet
• golf

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)