patten

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English patin, also paten,^[2][3] borrowed from Old French patin, the Anglo-Norman form, and Middle French patin (“shoe with an especially thick sole, clog”).^[4][5][6][7] The Anglo-Norman word is recorded from 1182, as a clog and as a surname,^[8] and the French one from 1260, later also for a shoe for walking on ice (1427), an ice skate (about 1475) and the base of a column (1538).^[4] The French word is formed from patte (“paw, foot”) and the suffix -in,^{[4][7][9][10]} an origin that the American Heritage Dictionary, Collins, the Oxford Dictionary of English and Etymonline call possible or probable.^{[6][11][12][5]} The OED compares Medieval Latin patinus (“wooden shoe, slipper”) (11th century), Italian pattino (“skate”) and Spanish patín (“clog”).^[4][13] It takes patte as probably of imitative origin;^[4] Merriam-Webster Unabridged traces it to an assumed Vulgar Latin *patta, of imitative origin,^[3] which Klein calls pre-Celtic,^[10] and Etymonline gives the form as *pauta, perhaps imitating the sound of a paw, with likely cognates in Occitan pauta, Dutch poot and German Pfote.^[5] A Celtic or a Germanic source has also been sought, without evidence.^[5] The OED takes earlier surnames such as Roger Patun (1250) as more probably pet forms of the name Patrick.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A thick-soled shoe, especially a wooden clog: 1390, in the Fabric Rolls of York Minster, which complain that the church servants wore patens et clogges in church and in procession.^[4][2][14] Etymonline dates it to the late 14th century.^[5]

Semantic evolution

From about 1574 the word was used for an overshoe that raised the ordinary shoe above wet or muddy ground;^[4][9] from the 17th century this was a thick wooden sole mounted on an oval iron ring;^[4] the Century Dictionary, quoted by Etymonline, dates the ringed patten to the early 18th century and says it was used in England until recently but little known in the United States.^[5] Johnson (1755) described it as a wooden shoe with an iron ring, worn under the common shoe by women to keep them out of the dirt, and quoted Gay's clinking pattens.^[15] Etymonline adds that it was later especially a thick-soled shoe worn by women to look taller.^[5] In the 1890s Wright's dialect dictionary still recorded the patten across Scotland and England, though going out of use, and noted that the Yorkshire patten, raised on its iron ring, was not the same as the Lancashire clog.^[16] The phrase to run on pattens, of the tongue, to chatter noisily, was used from 1546 to 1611.^[4] Through the French, the word also meant a wooden snowshoe of Arctic peoples (1555–1875) and an ice skate (from 1617),^[4][5] the usual word for a skate in Cambridgeshire in Weekley's day and still a regional word in eastern England.^[13][4] In architecture a patten has been the base of a column or a wall since 1643,^[4][9] while from 1789 to 1834 it was a round piece of wood fastened under a horse's hoof for boggy ground.^[4] A verb, to walk on pattens, is recorded from 1905, and in the north-west of England one meaning to skate in 1850.^[4]

Timeline

• 1390 – a thick-soled shoe; a wooden clog.^[4][2]
• 1546 – to run on pattens, to chatter noisily (obsolete by 1611).^[4]
• 1555 – a wooden snowshoe of Arctic peoples (obsolete by 1875).^[4]
• c. 1574 – an overshoe raising the foot above mud, later on an iron ring.^[4]
• 1617 – an ice skate.^[4] Etymonline dates it to the 1610s.^[5]
• 1643 – in architecture, the base of a column or wall.^[4]
• 1789 – a wooden plate fastened under a horse's hoof (obsolete by 1834).^[4]
• 1850 – verb, to skate (north-western English regional).^[4]
• 1905 – verb, to walk on pattens.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A clog or overshoe with a thick wooden sole, often set on an iron ring, worn to raise the foot above mud or wet ground: Her pattens clattered on the cobbles.^{[11][3][4][15]}
2. (historical) Any of various thick-soled shoes or wooden clogs.^[9][4]
3. (architecture) The base of a column; a bottom sill or support.^[4][9]
4. A round wooden plate fastened under a horse's hoof to keep it from sinking in boggy ground.^[3][9][4]
5. (regional) An ice skate.^[4][9][13]
6. (obsolete, 1555–1875) A wooden snowshoe.^[4][9]

Verb

1. To walk, or make one's way, on pattens.^[4][9]

Word family

• pattened

Related words

• patois
• patrol
• paw

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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 Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b c Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
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. ^ 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)