pestle

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English pestel,^[2][3] borrowed from Old French pestel,^[4][5][6] recorded from about 1180,^[7] also Anglo-Norman pestel,^[7][8] and in part directly borrowed from Latin pistillum (“pounder, pestle”).^[9][2] The OED explains the French noun as coming from an unattested variant Medieval Latin *pistellum, with a change of suffix;^[7] Medieval Latin also had pestellum.^[7][9] Ayto alone takes the English word through Italian pestello.^[10] The Latin noun is formed from the past participle stem pist- of pīnsō (“to pound, crush”),^[10][6][11] a verb from Proto-Indo-European *peis- (“to crush”);^[9] the OED and Partridge instead call it a diminutive of pīlum (“pestle”),^[7][12] which Partridge also connects with the verb.^[12] It is akin to Ancient Greek πτίσσειν (ptíssein, “to winnow, crush”)^[3][9][13] and Middle Low German vīsel (“pestle”).^[13] English pistil is a doublet.^[4][3] The verb is either a conversion of the noun or a borrowing of Anglo-Norman pesteler (“to pound, crush, mash”).^[7][13][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

A club-shaped tool for crushing substances in a mortar: c. 1350, in the Nominale.^[7] Barnhart has the form pestell from 1349,^[4] but the OED cannot say whether its own examples from 1345–9 show the English or the Anglo-Norman word.^[7] As a surname, Pestel is recorded from about 1280.^[4][7][9]

Semantic evolution

Anglo-Norman already used the word both for the mortar tool and for the foreleg of an animal as food,^[7][8] and English has both from the 14th century: Barnhart dates the leg sense to 1326,^[4] while the OED, unsure of its earlier evidence, starts it before 1425, in Forme of Cury.^[7] The phrase "the pestle of a lark", the leg of a lark, came to mean a trifle from 1598.^[7][9] By the time of Wright's dialect dictionary the leg sense was regional: the foreleg of a pig in West Yorkshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire and Shropshire, and "pestle of pork" in Somerset and Devon, where a pestle pie was a large standing pie holding a whole gammon.^[14] Other senses came and went: a threshing sledge in the Wycliffite Bible,^[7][2] a club or truncheon until 1794,^[7] and in botany the spadix of an aroid and, for a time, the pistil.^[7][11] Since 1604 it has also named pounding parts of machines, especially mills.^[7] From 1598 it was also slang for the penis, as the double meaning in The Knight of the Burning Pestle shows.^[15] Johnson (1755) gives only the mortar tool.^[16]

Timeline

• c. 1350 – a club-shaped tool for pounding in a mortar.^[7][9]
• before 1382 – a threshing sledge (obsolete by 1425).^[7][2]
• c. 1400 – figurative, something that crushes or grinds.^[7]
• before 1425 – the leg of an animal, especially a pig, as food.^[7] Barnhart has this sense from 1326.^[4]
• 1483 – verb, to beat or pound with a pestle.^[7] Barnhart dates the verb to 1413, the date of the text.^[4]
• before 1500 – a club or truncheon (obsolete by 1794).^[7]
• 1578 – the spadix of an aroid plant (obsolete by 1672).^[7]
• 1598 – the pestle of a lark, something very small, a trifle (obsolete by 1712).^[7]
• 1598 – slang, the penis.^[15]
• 1604 – a pounding or stamping part of a machine.^[7]
• 1866 – verb, intransitive, to work with a pestle.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A club-shaped hand tool for crushing or grinding substances in a mortar: She ground the cloves with a stone pestle.^[5][13][17]
2. A device or heavy bar that pounds, stamps or presses, as in a mill or press.^{[5][13][17][7]}
3. (chiefly British dialect) The leg of an animal, especially a pig, used as food.^[13][11][7]
4. (obsolete, before 1382–1425) A wooden tool for threshing grain, a threshing sledge.^[7][2]
5. (obsolete, 1578–1672) The spadix of an aroid plant.^[7][11]

Verb

1. To pound or grind something with a pestle, or as if with one.^[5][13][17]
2. To work with a pestle.^[5][13][7]

Related words

• pesto
• pistil
• piston
• pile
• ptisan

References

1. ^ 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 Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
4. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ 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
8. ^ a b Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
9. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
11. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
13. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
14. ^ 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)
15. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
17. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins