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poetry

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: UK /ˈpəʊ.ə.tri/, /ˈpəʊ.ɪ.tri/, US /ˈpoʊ.ə.tri/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English poetrie, borrowed from Old French poetrie and directly from Medieval Latin poetria,[2][3][4] from poēta (“poet”),[2][3] probably after Latin geometria.[5] In classical Latin poētria meant “poetess”, from Ancient Greek ποιήτρια (poiḗtria), the feminine of ποιητής (poiētḗs, “maker, poet”);[3][4] the classical word for poetry was poetica or poetice.[2] See poet.[3][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Poetry or creative literature: about 1380, in Chaucer's House of Fame, in Barnhart, about 1384 in the OED.[3][6]

Semantic evolution

In early use it often meant imaginative literature in general, fable or fiction, a sense obsolete by the early 17th century.[5][7] Composition in verse is from 1386,[6] the writings of a poet as a form of literature from 1586,[6] and the expression of beauty or feeling from 1581.[6] The figurative sense, poetic quality in anything, is from the 1660s.[2] In 1815 it was extended, with reference to the Greek sense “making”, to creative art in general.[6] Old English had metergeweorc “verse” and scopcræft “the poet's art”.[2]

Timeline

  • c. 1380 – poetry, creative literature.[3]
  • 1386 – composition in verse.[6]
  • 1586 – poetry as a body of writing.[6]
  • 1660s – figurative use.[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. Poems in general, as a form of literature; verse.
  2. The art or craft of writing poems.
  3. The poems of a particular writer, nation or period.
  4. A beautiful or moving quality in something: poetry in motion.

Word family

  • poetryless
  • concrete poetry
  • poesy
  • poet
  • poetess
  • poeticize
  • poetize
  • poetic
  • poetics
  • poem

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press