pate

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English pate,^[2][3] of unknown origin.^{[4][5][6][7][8][9][10]} The OED, revised in 2005, calls the origin uncertain: if the sense was first a metaphor, the word might be a shortening of Old French patène or of its source, Latin patena (“dish”) (compare paten), and it compares Middle Low German pate (“paten”), a similar shortening.^[11] Barnhart and Etymonline make the same guess,^[12][13] and Etymonline traces the Latin word to patina (“pan, dish”).^[13] An origin as a variant of plate has also been suggested, but the OED finds the loss of the l unlikely.^[11] Skeat thought it perhaps suggested by Late Latin platta (“the clerical tonsure”),^[14] and Johnson reported Skinner's derivation from French tête (“head”).^[15] The surname Pate is recorded from 1197,^[12][11] and the OED sees earlier currency in names such as Aluric Pate (c. 1100–30).^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The head or skull, especially the crown of the head: before 1325, in the Middle English poem Judas Iscariot.^[11][12] Etymonline dates the sense "top of the head" to the early 14th century.^[13]

Semantic evolution

According to Weekley the word was at first used in a dignified sense,^[7] as in Coverdale's psalm verse "His wickednes shall fall upon his owne pate".^[7] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as the head, noting that it was "now commonly used in contempt or ridicule, but antiently in serious language",^[15] and the Century Dictionary, quoted by Etymonline, found it usually trivial or derogatory.^[13] From about 1525 it formed derogatory compounds for a person with a mind of some kind,^[11] and in 1598, in Shakespeare's Love's Labour's Lost, it stood for the intellect or brain;^[11] Barnhart dates this transferred sense to The Tempest (1610).^[12] Scottish and northern use added the skin of a calf's head (1673–1885),^[11] and a rare 1878 sense was the fur from a black patch on the head of a rabbit or hare.^[11] The OED now labels the word archaic and humorous, and today it is used especially of a bald head.^[11][10] In the 19th century it was still a plain word for the head in the dialects of Scotland and of counties from Northumberland to Sussex, with forms such as paate, pat, peeat and pyte.^[16]

Timeline

• before 1325 – the head, the skull, the crown of the head.^[11][12]
• c. 1525 – as the second part of derogatory compounds for a person of a certain mind.^[11]
• 1598 – the intellect, the brain.^[11] Barnhart dates this sense to 1610.^[12]
• 1673 – the skin of a calf's head (obsolete by 1885).^[11]
• 1878 – the fur from a black patch on a rabbit's or hare's head (rare).^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. The head, especially its top or crown, now often of a bald head; archaic or humorous: The noon sun burned his shiny pate.^{[10][3][11][8]}
2. The head as the seat of the intellect; the brain or wits, usually in jest.^[3][11][10]

Word family

• pated
• baldpate
• rattlepate

Related words

• paten

Usage notes

In northern English dialect pate also meant a badger, recorded by the OED from 1628 in the churchwardens' accounts of Pittington; the OED and Merriam-Webster Unabridged suggest it is the same word, from the white top of the badger's head, which recalls a bald pate.^[11][3] Wright's dialect dictionary lists it for Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmorland and Yorkshire, with a 1649 entry in the Ryton church books paying for three paite heades.^[16]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Stratmann, Francis Henry (1891), A Middle-English Dictionary, revised by Henry Bradley, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
6. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
8. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
11. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
13. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
14. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
15. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ a b 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)