prodigious

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin prōdigiōsus (“portentous, marvellous, unnatural”),^[2][3][4][5] formed from prōdigium (“omen, portent, monster”), the source of prodigy, and the suffix -ōsus, English -ous.^[2][4][5] Etymonline sees a second source: it is also borrowed from French prodigieux.^[6] The OED instead treats the French adjective, recorded from the 14th century, only as a parallel, beside Catalan prodigiós, Spanish prodigioso (mid-16th century) and Italian prodigioso (before 1450).^[2] The origin of the Latin noun is disputed.^[2] Etymonline and Klein take it as formed from prō (“forth, before”) (early prōd-) and an element perhaps related to aiō (“I say”),^[6][7] as Trench did after Brugmann;^[8] Etymonline also mentions de Vaan's link with agō (“to drive”), from Proto-Indo-European *ag- (“to drive”).^[6] The OED rejects the connection with aiō on grounds of sense and form, and notes a possible derivation from prōdigō (“to drive forth; squander”), though the senses do not clearly match.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Both "of the nature of an omen, portentous" and "causing wonder, marvellous" appear first in Skelton's translation of Diodorus Siculus, about 1487.^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged likewise dates the omen sense to the 15th century,^[4] and the Oxford Dictionary of English gives the late 15th century, in the sense "portentous".^[9] Etymonline dates the word to the 1550s.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The word first described what was taken as an omen, a sense now rare or obsolete.^[2][4][10] Shakespeare used it in this way in A Midsummer Night's Dream and King John, where it means "portentous, horrible".^[11] Alongside it ran the sense "causing amazement", which could also turn unfavourable, "appalling";^[2] from 1569 it also meant "unnatural, abnormal, freakish", now archaic.^[2][6] The modern main sense, "of great size or amount, enormous", is recorded from 1601, in P. Holland's translation of Pliny.^[2][6] Johnson (1755) still listed "portentous" and "monstrous" next to "amazingly great".^[12] Trench (1859) observed that the word by then expressed little more than magnitude, and quoted Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster for the older sense: an axe shall hang "like a prodigious meteor".^[8] The word also served as an adverb, "exceedingly", from 1694 (Etymonline: by the 1670s),^[2][6] and as an exclamation of astonishment from 1707 to 1886.^[2] Since 1960 it has been used of a person who is exceptionally or precociously gifted, a sense that recalls prodigy.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1487 – of the nature of an omen, portentous; also causing wonder, marvellous.^[2]
• 1569 – unnatural, abnormal, freakish.^[2]
• 1601 – enormous, immense, extreme.^[2]
• 1694 – adverb, prodigiously, exceedingly.^[2] Etymonline dates the adverbial use to the 1670s.^[6]
• 1707 – as an interjection expressing astonishment (obsolete by 1886).^[2]
• 1960 – of a person, exceptionally or precociously talented.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Remarkably great in size, extent, amount or degree; enormous: The new stadium cost a prodigious sum.^[10][4][2]
2. Causing amazement or wonder; marvellous.^[10][4][2]
3. Of a person, exceptionally or precociously talented.^[2]
4. (archaic) Unnatural or abnormal; strange.^[4][2]
5. (obsolete) Having the nature of an omen; portentous or threatening.^[4][10] The OED calls this sense now rare.^[2]

Adverb

1. (archaic) Prodigiously, exceedingly.^[2][5]

Word family

• prodigiously
• prodigiousness

Related words

• prodigy
• prestigious

Usage notes

Dictionary.com lists prodigious among the words easily confused with prestigious.^[13]

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 u v w x y Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c 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 h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b Trench, Richard Chenevix (1859), A Select Glossary of English Words Used Formerly in Senses Different from Their Present, London: John W. Parker
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
11. ^ Skeat, Walter W.; Mayhew, A. L. (1914), A Glossary of Tudor and Stuart Words, Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House