predatory

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin praedātōrius (“marauding, plundering, piratical”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} from praedātor (“plunderer”),^[2][3][4][7] from praedor (“to plunder, take as booty”),^[3][4][8][7] from praeda (“booty, plunder, prey”),^[3][8][5][7] the source of prey.^[3][4][7] The American Heritage Dictionary refers the Latin noun to the root Proto-Indo-European *gʰend-,^[8] and Skeat analysed praeda as "that which is seized beforehand", from prae- (“before”) and the base of prehendō (“to seize”), which he took as cognate with get.^[9] The English suffix corresponds to -ory.^[2][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of, relating to or involving plunder and pillage: 1589, in Puttenham's Arte of English Poesie.^[2][4][10] Etymonline dates this sense, "involving plundering or pillaging", to the 1580s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From 1650 the word was used of people given to plunder or living by it,^[2] and Johnson (1755) defined it as "plundering; practising rapine", quoting Bacon on a "predatory war" made by Scotland.^[11] The zoological sense, of an animal that preys on other animals, followed in 1668, in Bishop Wilkins's Essay Towards a Real Character,^[2][3][12] and after 1781 the word was also used of predation in general.^[2] Bacon's use of it for "harmful to health, wasting" (1626) did not last beyond the mid-18th century,^[2][12][11] although Johnson still listed it with the sense "hungry; preying; rapacious".^[11] The modern figurative use, of a person who ruthlessly exploits others, often coloured by the animal sense and in later use especially in sexual relations, grew from the older sense of plundering.^[2][6] In business, from 1912, it describes unfair or exploitative competition, as in predatory pricing, the setting of very low prices to drive smaller competitors out of the market.^[2][6] The noun predator is much later: Barnhart dates it to 1922, after an earlier zoological group name Predatores (1840) for insects that prey on other insects.^[4][13]

Timeline

• 1589 – of or involving plunder or pillage, in Puttenham.^[2][4][10]
• 1626 – harmful to health, wasting, in Bacon (obsolete by 1751).^[2][12]
• 1650 – of a person, living by plunder; rapacious.^[2]
• 1668 – of an animal, preying on other animals.^[2][3]
• 1755 – Johnson defines it as plundering, and as hungry, preying.^[11]
• 1781 – of or relating to predation or predatory animals.^[2]
• 1912 – of business practices, unfairly competitive or exploitative.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of an animal, living by preying on other animals: Owls are predatory birds.^[8][2][14]
2. Living by or involving plunder, pillage or marauding: predatory raids along the coast.^[8][10][14]
3. Inclined to exploit others for one's own gain; ruthless and rapacious, often in a sexual sense: She noticed his predatory stare.^[8][10][2]
4. Of business or lending practices, unfairly competitive or exploitative: predatory pricing.^[2][6][8]
5. (obsolete) Harmful to health; debilitating or wasting.^[2][10][11]

Word family

• predatorily
• predatoriness
• nonpredatory
• unpredatory

Related words

• predaceous
• predacious
• predation
• predator
• prey
• depredation
• prehensile

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 n o p q r s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c d e f g The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ a b c d e Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
13. ^ Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
14. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins