motorist

Etymology

It is formed from English motor + -ist.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Motor is from Late Latin motor (“mover”), an agent noun from moveō (“to move”), from Proto-Indo-European *meue- (“to push away”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The driver of a motor car: 1896, in the Daily News of 14 November.^[2][7][3] Etymonline notes an earlier use, in 1889, as a name for the drivers of electric railway cars.^[3]

Semantic evolution

When the word was needed in 1889 for drivers of electric railway cars, it competed with motorneer, motorer, motor-man and motor-driver; the journal Electric Power reported that C. P. G. Scott, the etymologist of the Century Dictionary, preferred motor-man or motor-driver but would accept motorist above any other single word.^[3] The word took hold with the motor car itself: the verb motor, to travel in a motor vehicle, is also first recorded in 1896.^[3][2] Beside the driver, it was used occasionally of anyone travelling by car, and for a time of an enthusiast for motoring, a sense the OED now calls rare.^[2][4]

Timeline

• 1889 – a driver of an electric railway car.^[3]
• 1896 – the driver of a motor car, or occasionally anyone who travels in one.^[2][7][3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person who drives a car, especially one considered as a car owner: Motorists faced long queues at the toll bridge.^[8][2]
2. A person who habitually drives or travels by car.^[7][4][2]

Word family

• nonmotorist

Related words

• motor
• motorman
• motion
• move

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins