mute

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English muet, also mewet and muwet,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman muet and Old French muet (“unable to speak; silent”),^[5][3][6] a diminutive in -et of mu or mut,^[5][3] from Latin mūtus (“silent, dumb”).^[5][6][3] The Anglo-Norman word is recorded from 1171–74, also as a noun and a surname.^[7] The English form was remodelled after the Latin in the 16th century,^[6][4][5] and the word originally had two syllables.^[8] The Latin adjective is probably an imitative formation,^[5][6] and Partridge thinks it was at first said of animals that can utter only mū.^[9] It is related to Ancient Greek μῡκός (mūkós) and μύτις (mútis), dumb,^[3][10] and Barnhart traces it to Proto-Indo-European *mu- (“imitation of a dull sound made with pressed lips”).^[3] Klein and Hoad compare mutter.^[11][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of a person, unable to speak: about 1400, in a manuscript of Langland's Piers Plowman composed about 1378;^[5] silent, refraining from speech, in Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, about 1385, in the form muwet.^[3][5][12]

Semantic evolution

Surnames such as Robertus Mut (1187) and Alanus le Mute (1275) show the word earlier.^[5][6] The noun, a person who does not speak, is recorded about 1378;^[3] from the 1570s a mute was an actor in a dumb show;^[6] Weekley dates this use to the 17th century and the hired funeral mute to the 18th.^[13] The adjective was extended to things that make no sound (c. 1500), to people struck dumb by shock or emotion (1483), and to hounds that hunt without giving tongue (1677).^[5] In grammar it described a stopped consonant (1589) and a letter that is not pronounced (1638).^[5] Johnson (1755) defined it as "silent; not vocal; not having the use of voice".^[14] The noun for a device that deadens the tone of an instrument is recorded by 1811 for strings and 1841 for horns,^[6] and the verb, to muffle the sound of something, from 1841 in the OED,^[5] 1861 in Etymonline,^[6] and 1883 in Barnhart and Merriam-Webster.^[3][10] Its figurative use, to tone down, dates from 1891.^[5] Electronics brought the senses of switching off the sound of a loudspeaker or a television (1962), of a person on a phone call (1988), and of notifications or other users on social media (2007).^[5] The sense "unable to speak" is now considered offensive.^[5][15][16]

Timeline

• 1187 – the surname Robertus Mut.^[5]
• c. 1378 – noun, a person who does not speak.^[3]
• c. 1385 – silent, refraining from speech.^[3][5]
• c. 1400 – unable to speak.^[5]
• 1483 – temporarily speechless.^[5]
• 1570s – noun, an actor in a dumb show.^[6]
• 1638 – of a letter, not pronounced.^[5]
• 1677 – of a hound, not giving tongue.^[5]
• 1811 – noun, a device to deaden the tone of a stringed instrument.^[6]
• 1841 – verb, to muffle the sound of something.^[5]
• 1891 – verb, to tone down.^[5]
• 1962 – verb, to switch off the sound of a loudspeaker or device.^[5]
• 2007 – verb, to silence notifications or a user online.^[5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Not speaking; silent: She sat mute through the whole meeting.^[16][17][15]
2. (offensive) Unable to speak.^[16][15][5]
3. Expressed without speech; unspoken: a mute plea for help.^[16][15]
4. (law) Of a person charged with a crime: refusing to enter a plea, especially in to stand mute.^[16][15][17]
5. (phonetics) Of a letter: not pronounced, like the b in lamb.^[16][15][5]
6. (phonetics) Plosive; stopped.^[16][15]

Noun

1. A device used to soften or muffle the tone of a musical instrument.^[15][10][6]
2. A control that turns off the sound of an electronic device, or the state of having the sound turned off: She watched the match on mute.^[15]
3. (offensive) A person who cannot speak.^[10][3]
4. A person hired to attend a funeral as a mourner.^[10][13]
5. (archaic) An actor with no speaking part.^[10][6]
6. (phonetics) A stop consonant.^[10]

Verb

1. To soften or muffle the sound of something, especially a musical instrument.^[10][5][8]
2. To turn off the sound of a device, or of a person on a call: He muted the television when the phone rang.^[5][15]
3. To tone down or subdue something, such as a colour or a reaction.^[10][5][8]

Word family

• mutely
• muteness
• mutism
• deaf-mute
• mute swan

Related words

• mutter
• muted
• mum

Usage notes

A verb mute, of a bird, especially a hawk, to void its droppings, recorded from before 1475, has a separate source: Middle French muetir, probably shortened from esmeutir, from a Germanic word related to smelt; its noun means bird droppings.^{[5][8][10][2]} An archaic noun mute, a pack of hounds, comes from Old French muete, from Latin moveō (“to move”).^[8][5]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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)
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
8. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
13. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
15. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
16. ^ a b c d e f g The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
17. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House