maternal

Etymology

It is either borrowed from Middle French maternel or its probable source borrowed from Medieval Latin māternālis,^[2][3][4] formed from Latin māternus (“of a mother”) + -ālis;^[2][5] Barnhart suggests that māternālis was modelled on mātrōnālis (“befitting a matron”).^[6] Māternus is derived from māter (“mother”),^{[7][8][9][10]} which is cognate with English mother.^[11][12] The Anglo-Norman maternel is recorded from about 1380,^[13] and Middle French maternel from about 1370, at first in a phrase meaning "mother tongue".^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of a language, native or first learned, a mother tongue: 1481, in William Caxton's translation of the Mirror of the World.^[2][6][14] Etymonline dates the word to the late 15th century,^[7] and Dictionary.com to 1475–85.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The sense "of or relating to a mother, motherly" followed in 1492, in the poems of James Ryman,^[2] and became the main one;^[2][7] Johnson (1755) defined the word as motherly, befitting or pertaining to a mother.^[15] The OED records "belonging to a mother" from 1605 and "related through the mother", as in maternal uncle, from 1650;^[2][14] Etymonline dates "inherited or derived from a mother" to the 1650s.^[7] In anatomy and medicine it was used from 1691 of what belongs to the mother as opposed to the fetus.^[2] "Being a mother" is recorded from 1748, in Samuel Richardson's Clarissa,^[2] and "having the instincts of a mother" from 1785, in William Cowper's The Task;^[2] Etymonline gives 1784.^[7] In British schoolboy slang the maternal meant one's mother from 1867, a use now archaic.^[2] The figurative application to a country or river regarded as a mother (a1522, Gavin Douglas) is now rare.^[2]

Timeline

• 1481 – of a language, native.^[2][6]
• 1492 – of or relating to a mother; motherly.^[2]
• a1522 – figurative, of a country or river regarded as a mother.^[2]
• 1650 – related through the mother.^[2]
• 1691 – anatomy and medicine, belonging to the mother rather than the fetus.^[2]
• 1785 – having the instincts of a mother.^[2]
• 1867 – British slang, the maternal, one's mother.^[2]

Modern meaning

Adjective

1. Of, relating to or typical of a mother; motherly: She felt a maternal concern for the new recruits.
2. Related through the mother's side of the family: my maternal grandfather.
3. (medicine) Of or relating to the mother during pregnancy, as distinct from the fetus: maternal health.

Word family

• maternalism
• maternally
• maternalistic
• nonmaternal
• unmaternal
• maternalize

Related words

• maternity
• mother
• matron
• matrix
• material
• matter
• paternal

References

1. ^ a b 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 s Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
7. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
13. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
14. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.