paternal

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English paternal, also paternel,^[2] borrowed from Old French paternel^[3][2] and directly borrowed from Late Latin paternālis (“of or relating to a father”),^[3][4][2] from paternus (“of a father, fatherly; on the father's side”),^[3][5] from pater (“father”),^[3][5][4] with the suffixes -nus and -ālis.^[3][6] The Latin adjective is recorded from the 4th century, and often in British sources from about 1250.^[3] The American Heritage Dictionary traces pater to Proto-Indo-European *pəter-,^[4] the source of father.^[5][7] The OED compares paternal, paternal and paternal.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of or relating to a father, or to God as the father of mankind: before 1450, in Lydgate's Life of Saints Edmund and Fremund, composed about 1433.^[3][2][8] Etymonline dates it to the early 15th century.^[5]

Semantic evolution

In the 15th century the word was used of one's own father (before 1500), and later of anything fatherly in care or authority.^[3] Etymonline dates "characteristic of a father" to about 1600.^[5] The sense "inherited from a father, related on the father's side" is recorded in 1610, in Guillim's Display of Heraldry,^[3] although Barnhart finds it in the adverb paternally by 1603.^[8] Fatherly rule was called paternal government,^[3][9] which led to paternalism, recorded in American English from 1881.^[8]

Timeline

• before 1450 – of or relating to a father; fatherly.^[3][2]
• before 1500 – belonging to one's own father.^[3]
• 1610 – inherited from or related through a father.^[3]
• 1667 – being a father, in Milton's Paradise Lost.^[3]
• 1881 – the derivative paternalism.^[8]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of or like a father; fatherly: He took a paternal interest in the young players.^[10][4][11]
2. Received or inherited from one's father: paternal genes.^[10][4][11]
3. Related through one's father: her paternal grandmother.^[10][4][11]

Word family

• paternally
• nonpaternal
• paternalism
• unpaternal

Related words

• paternity
• father
• pater
• patron
• patriarch
• maternal
• fraternal

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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 m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
8. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins