meeting

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English meting, partly from early Middle English imeting,^[2][3] inherited from Old English ġemēting (“meeting, assembly”),^[2][4][5] and partly re-formed from English meet + -ing in Middle English.^[2][4][6] The Old English noun comes from the verb ġemētan (“to meet”),^[5] whose simple form mētan (“to find, encounter”) is from Proto-Germanic *mōtijaną,^[7][1] the source also of Old Norse mœta, Old Saxon mōtian and Gothic 𐌲𐌰𐌼𐍉𐍄𐌾𐌰𐌽 (gamōtjan).^[7][8] The verb is related to ġemōt (“meeting, assembly”), the source of moot.^[7][8] Etymonline derives it from Proto-Indo-European *mod- (“to meet, assemble”).^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The act of coming together; an assembly: in Old English, in the Rule of St Benet.^[2] In Beowulf a speaker says Is undyrne uncer gemeting, our meeting is no secret.^[9][5] The Middle English Dictionary records imeting glossing Latin conventus about 1225.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word first meant any act of coming together; from about 1330 to 1596 it was also used for an armed encounter or battle.^[2] it was used again for a duel from 1813, a sense now historical.^[2][6] From about 1425 it named a gathering of people for entertainment, discussion or legislation,^[2] although Etymonline dates the specific sense of a gathering for discussion to the 1510s.^[7] From 1593 it was used for an assembly for worship, especially of Nonconformists;^[2] in England and Ireland in the 17th century it was applied to all their worship, a use now kept mostly by the Quakers, and in the early United States, especially in country districts, to any religious assembly.^[7] In the 19th century going to meeting still meant going to chapel in Ulster, Northumberland, Berkshire, Devon and Cornwall, and a meetinger was a Nonconformist in several southern and eastern counties.^[10] The word was used of things coming together, such as rivers or lines, from before 1387, in Trevisa,^[2] and of a sporting event from 1676.^[2] Chaucer used metinge twice for a meeting.^[11] Johnson (1755) defined it as an assembly or convention, a congress, an assembly of Dissenters, and a conflux, as of two rivers.^[12]

Timeline

• Old English – the act of coming together; an assembly.^[2][5]
• c. 1330 – an armed encounter, a battle (obsolete by 1596).^[2]
• before 1387 – the joining or coming together of things, as rivers or lines.^[2]
• c. 1425 – a gathering of people for entertainment, discussion or legislation.^[2] Etymonline dates the sense of a gathering for discussion to the 1510s.^[7]
• 1565 – to give a person a meeting, to meet them.^[2]
• 1593 – an assembly for worship, especially of Nonconformists.^[2]
• 1676 – a gathering for a sporting competition, a race meeting.^[2]
• 1813 – a duel.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A gathering of people, especially one arranged for discussion or for doing business: The board holds its meeting every Tuesday.^[13][6][2]
2. An act of coming together; an encounter, whether planned or by chance: their first meeting since college.^[13][6]
3. An assembly for religious worship, especially of the Quakers; the governing body of a Quaker congregation.^[6][2][7]
4. A sporting event, especially a race meeting.^[2]
5. A place or point where things come together; a junction.^[2][12]
6. (archaic) A duel.^[6][2]

Word family

• go-to-meeting
• Sunday-go-to-meeting
• town meeting

Related words

• meet
• moot

References

1. ^ a b c 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 t u v w Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
4. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
6. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ Klaeber, Fr., ed. (1922), Beowulf and The Fight at Finnsburg, Boston: D. C. Heath
10. ^ 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)
11. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
12. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin