necrosis

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin necrōsis (“mortification”),^[2][3][4] recorded in post-classical Latin from the 5th century;^[2] the Shorter Oxford, Collins and the Oxford Dictionary of English call the Latin word Modern Latin,^[5][6][7] and Barnhart takes the English word as probably borrowed from Greek.^[8] The Latin is from Ancient Greek νέκρωσις (nékrōsis, “mortification, state of death”),^[2][9][10] which in Hellenistic Greek also meant the suppression of impure thoughts or actions.^[2] It is formed from νεκρόω (nekróō, “to make dead, mortify”), from νεκρός (nekrós, “corpse; dead”),^{[2][9][10][3]} with the suffix that gives English -osis.^[2][10] Etymonline and the American Heritage Dictionary trace the Greek word to Proto-Indo-European *nek- (“death”),^[11][4] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged refers it to the same source as noxious.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Death of tissue or cells: 1583, in P. Barrough's Methode of Phisicke.^[2][3] Etymonline dates the word to the 1660s, Barnhart to 1665 and Dictionary.com to 1655–65; the OED's 2003 revision found the earlier record.^{[11][8][12][2]}

Semantic evolution

The word has stayed a medical term for the death of cells or tissue, especially in a limited area.^[2][13][14] In 1706 Phillips's New World of Words recorded a theological sense, self-mortification, now obsolete and always rare.^[2] From 1866 it was applied to the death of plant tissue in plant pathology,^[2][6] and since 1953 it has been used figuratively.^[2]

Timeline

• 1583 – death of tissue or cells, in pathology.^[2][3]
• 1706 – self-mortification, in theology (obsolete).^[2]
• 1866 – death of plant tissue.^[2]
• 1953 – figurative use.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The death of cells or tissue in a living body, usually in a limited area, from injury, disease or loss of blood supply.^{[13][6][3][2][14]}
2. (botany) The death of plant tissue from disease, frost or similar damage.^[6][2]
3. Figuratively, decay or death in something other than a body.^[2]

Word family

• necrotic
• osteoradionecrosis
• avascular necrosis
• tumor necrosis factor

Related words

• necrobiosis
• necro-
• necrology
• necromancy
• noxious

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. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
12. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
13. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
14. ^ a b Stedman's Medical Dictionary, Baltimore: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins