midnight

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈmɪd.naɪt/^[1]

Etymology

It is Middle English mid-niht, midnight, inherited from Old English midniht, also middre niht, with the dative of the adjective,^[2][3][4] from Old English midd (“middle”) + niht (“night”) (see mid and night).^[4][3][5] Compare Old High German mittinaht, Middle Dutch midnacht and German Mitternacht.^[2][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The middle of the night, 12 o'clock at night: Old English mid-niht, middeneaht before 899, in Alfred's translation of Bede's Ecclesiastical History.^[2][6]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English it is mid-niht in Layamon's Brut (probably before 1200) and mydnyght in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (about 1385).^[2] As an adjective, occurring at midnight, it is from 1390,^[6] and as dark as midnight from 1601.^[6] Figurative intense darkness or gloom, or a period of it, is from 1593.^[6][7] Midnight oil, standing for late-night work, as in burning the midnight oil, is from the 1630s.^[3][8] Mother midnight was 17th-century slang for a midwife or bawd, now obsolete,^[6] and in Nottinghamshire dialect midnight was a contemptuous name for someone slow or behindhand with their work.^[9]

Timeline

• before 899 – Old English mid-niht, in Alfred's Bede.^[2]
• c. 1385 – mydnyght, in Chaucer.^[2]
• 1390 – as an adjective.^[6]
• 1593 – intense darkness, gloom.^[6]
• 1630s – midnight oil.^[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. The middle of the night; twelve o'clock at night.
2. Deep darkness or gloom, or a period of it.

Adjective

1. Happening or done at midnight: the midnight hour.

Word family

• midnightly
• premidnight
• postmidnight
• midnight blue
• midnight sun

Related words

• mid
• night
• midday
• midst

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 Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ 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)