pun

Etymology

Its origin is unknown.^[2][3][4][5] It was probably one of the clipped words, such as mob and cit, that became fashionable slang after the Restoration,^[6][7][5][8] and longer forms with the same meaning, punnet and pundigrion, appear soon after it.^[7][9][5] Many dictionaries suggest that it is short for pundigrion (recorded from 1673),^{[8][4][10][11][2]} which may in turn be a fanciful alteration of punctilio or of its source Italian puntiglio (“fine point, quibble”);^{[2][8][7][11]} Merriam-Webster and Klein derive pun from the Italian word directly, Klein from a diminutive of Latin pūnctum (“point”).^[12][13] The OED notes that no exact parallel in meaning is attested for either the English or the Italian word,^[2] Barnhart that nothing in the early history of pun confirms the link,^[7] and Etymonline calls it pure speculation.^[6] Weekley compared French pointe (“a verbal conceit”), much used in the 17th century in a similar sense.^[5][13] Dictionary.com suggests instead a special use of the dialect verb pun, to pound, as if to mistreat words,^[14] and Johnson had wondered whether it meant an empty sound, like a mortar being beaten.^[15] Partridge once thought of a blend of puzzle and conundrum.^[16]

Earliest recorded meaning

The use of a word so as to suggest two or more meanings, or of words of nearly the same sound with different meanings: 1644, in John Taylor's Mercurius Aquaticus,^[2][12] apparently with a hidden play on Thames and tame.^[6] Barnhart dates it to 1662, in Dryden's The Wild Gallant.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Addison described a pun as "a Conceit arising from the use of two Words that agree in the Sound, but differ in the Sense",^[6] and Johnson (1755) defined it as "an equivocation; a quibble; an expression where a word has at once different meanings".^[15] The verb, to make puns, followed in 1670,^[2][12][7] by the 1660s in Dryden according to Etymonline,^[6] and Addison used it humorously in 1711 for bringing someone into a state by punning.^[2][10] The agent noun punster is first recorded in 1700, in Congreve's The Way of the World.^[7]

Timeline

• 1644 – noun, a play on words.^[2][12]
• 1662 – in Dryden's The Wild Gallant.^[7]
• 1670 – verb, to make puns.^[2][12][7]
• 1673 – pundigrion, a pun (obsolete by 1820).^[2]
• 1700 – punster.^[7]
• 1711 – transitive, to bring into a state by punning.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A humorous use of a word that suggests two or more meanings, or of words that sound alike but differ in meaning; a play on words: His speech was full of awful puns about fish.^{[17][12][3][2]}

Verb

1. To make a pun or puns: They punned on the coach's name all season.^{[17][12][3][2]}
2. (rare) To bring someone into a state by punning.^[12][2][10]

Word family

• punningly
• punless
• punny
• punster

Related words

• punctilio
• pundigrion
• punnet

Usage notes

Other words spelled pun are a dialect verb meaning to pound or ram down, a variant of pound,^{[12][10][11][2]} and a former Indian money of account of eighty cowries, borrowed from Sanskrit (from 1683).^[2]

References

1. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
6. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
8. ^ a b c Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ 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
11. ^ a b c Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
13. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
14. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
15. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
17. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins