ogre

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈoʊ.ɡɚ/; /ˈəʊ.ɡə/ (UK)^[1]

Etymology

borrowed from French ogre,^{[2][3][4][5][6][1]} which first appears in Charles Perrault's fairy tales (1697) and may be his own coinage.^[6] Most sources trace it, perhaps through a dialect form of Italian orco (“demon, monster”), to Latin Orcus, the god of the underworld.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Barnhart also allows an Old French *orc as the link.^[5] Etymonline calls Orcus of unknown origin,^[6] while Wiktionary derives it from Greek Hórkos, the spirit of oaths who punishes oath-breakers.^[1] Etymonline rejects the old idea that ogre comes from a name for the Hungarians, saying it lacks historical evidence.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A man-eating giant of fairy tales, first recorded in English in 1713 as hogre, in a translation of a French version of the Arabian Nights.^[6][7][3][5]

Semantic evolution

The OED's definition also covers a person likened to such a monster,^[7] and the word now often means a cruel, brutish or frightening person.^[2][3][4][1] Etymonline describes it as more literary than colloquial in English.^[6]

Timeline

• 1697 – French ogre, in Perrault's Contes.^[6]
• 1713 – English hogre.^[6][7][3][5]
• 1786 – the spelling ogre.^[5]
• 1846 – compounds such as ogre-king.^[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. In folklore and fairy tales, a hideous giant or monster that eats people.
2. A cruel, brutish or hideous person; anyone or anything greatly feared.

Word family

• ogreish
• ogreishly
• ogreism

Related words

• ogress
• orc
• Orcus

References

1. [1] [2] [3] [4] Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. [1] [2] [3] The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
3. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. [1] [2] [3] Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
5. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
6. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] Harper, Douglas, Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. [1] [2] [3] [4] Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press