predator

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin praedātor (“plunderer, pillager, robber; hunter”),^[2][3][4][5] formed from praedātus, the past participle of praedor (“to plunder, prey on”), and the agent suffix -or.^[2][3] The verb comes from praeda (“booty, plunder; game hunted”),^[5][6] the source of prey.^[5][4] Etymonline traces the noun to an earlier praeheda (“something seized before”), from prae- and a second element related to that of prehendō (“to grasp, seize”), from Proto-Indo-European *ghend- (“to seize, take”).^[5][4] Compare Middle French prédateur (“plunderer”), recorded in French from 1574.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A person who plunders or pillages: 1581, in Barnabe Rich's Don Simonides.^[2][3] The OED regards this as an isolated early borrowing,^[2] and the Oxford Dictionary of English and Dictionary.com date the word only from the 1920s.^[7][6]

Semantic evolution

The zoological sense, an animal that kills and eats other animals, made the word common: Etymonline dates it to 1862,^[5] and the OED's first record is from 1908, in the journal Science;^[2] the Shorter Oxford places it in the early 20th century.^[8] The OED compares the scientific Latin Predatores, used by Swainson in 1840 for a group of beetles that eat other insects.^[2][5] The related words predation and predatory were older in English, the zoological sense of predation dating from 1907.^[5] From the mid-20th century the word was again used of rapacious or exploitative people,^[8][2] and in business, from 1969, of a company that makes, or is expected to make, a takeover bid for another.^[2][8] In American law it also names an animal or bird that is not counted as game and has no protection under the game laws.^[3]

Timeline

• 1581 – a plunderer (an isolated early use).^[2]
• 1840 – scientific Latin Predatores, a group of beetles.^[2][5]
• 1862 – an animal that preys on others (Etymonline).^[5]
• 1908 – an animal that preys on others (OED).^[2]
• 1969 – a company seeking to take over another.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. An animal that kills and eats other animals; a carnivore: Foxes are the main predator of the island's ground-nesting birds.
2. A person or group that robs, victimizes or exploits others.
3. (business) A company that seeks to take over another, especially against its wishes.

Related words

• predation
• predatory
• prey

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press