Etymologically
Log in

puppet

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 22 October 2026 at 21:23. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

Etymology

It is a later form of poppet,[2][3][4] inherited from Middle English popet (“doll; small figure used in witchcraft”), recorded from about 1300.[5][6] That word is probably borrowed from Old French popette (“little doll, puppet”),[5][6] a diminutive of popee (“doll”), which survives as poupée.[5][7][8] The French words go back to Vulgar Latin *puppa, a variant of Latin pūpa (“girl; doll”),[5][7][9] which also gave English pupa and pupil.[10][11] Barnhart finds the word used as an English surname as early as 1191.[6] The OED, revising the entry in 2007, compares the earliest sense, "puppy", with the noun puppy.[2][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The spelling puppet is first found ?1531, in Robert Barnes, for a small dog, a puppy; that sense was obsolete by the late 17th century.[2] The figure moved by strings or wires is recorded from 1538, in Thomas Elyot's Dictionary,[2][6][7] and Etymonline dates that sense to the 1530s.[5]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English a popet was a doll, a small person, or a wax figure used in sorcery.[6][5] In the 16th century puppet was used scornfully for an idol (1534) and for a child's doll (1550), and it came to mean especially the jointed figure worked by strings in a show,[2][11] while poppet kept the affectionate senses.[11][12] Ayto notes that puppet took over the sense of the moving figure completely.[11] The figurative sense, a person whose actions are directed by someone else, is recorded from the 1540s in the spelling poppet,[5] 1550 according to Barnhart,[6] and as puppet from 1592.[2] The same period used it for a bad actor (a1592) and for a gaudily dressed, empty person, especially a woman (1595).[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as a small image moved in a mock drama, "a wooden tragedian".[13] The puppet show is attested from the 1650s,[5] and the verb, to manipulate someone like a puppet, from 1840.[2] In the 20th century it was used of governments and states set up and controlled by a foreign power.[14][7]

Timeline

  • 1191 – the surname Pupet.[6]
  • c. 1300 – Middle English popet, a doll or figure used in sorcery.[5][6]
  • ?1531 – puppet, a puppy (obsolete).[2]
  • 1534 – an idol.[2]
  • 1538 – a figure moved by strings or wires.[2][6][7]
  • 1540s – a person controlled by another, as poppet;[5] 1592 as puppet.[2]
  • 1595 – a gaudily dressed, empty person.[2]
  • 1650s – puppet show.[5]
  • 1840 – the verb, to manipulate like a puppet.[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A small figure of a person or animal that is made to move by strings, rods or a hand inside it, especially in a show.
  2. A person, group or state that seems independent but is actually controlled by another: The governor was a puppet of the mine owners.
  3. (archaic) An idol.
  4. (archaic) A vain, gaudily dressed person.

Verb

  1. To control or manipulate someone as if they were a puppet.

Word family

  • puppetlike
  • puppeteer
  • puppetry
  • hand puppet
  • puppet show
  • finger puppet

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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  4. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  7. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  8. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  9. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  10. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  11. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  12. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  14. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins