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Etymology and origin of the English word quid

English has two main words spelled quid: the slang word for a pound, of uncertain origin, and the piece of tobacco for chewing, a variant of cud.[1][2][3]

Pronunciation

quid1 pound sterling

Confidence
Uncertain
First attested
1661 Strange Newes from Bartholomew-Fair

Etymology

The pound is of uncertain or unknown origin.[1][3][5][6][7][8] The OED suggests that it may be Latin quid (“what, something”), the neuter of quis (“who”), taken in English to mean one's means or wherewithal.[1][9] Barnhart, Etymonline and Ayto connect it with the Latin phrase in quid pro quo, something for something, in English since 1565,[10][11][2] and Weekley and Etymonline compare the argot word French quibus, money.[12][11] The OED rejects the idea that it is the same word as the chewing quid, which is recorded later.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Money, in the plural: “his Quids were vanisht”, in “Strange Newes from Bartholomew-Fair” (1661).[1][13] The OED reads it as a sovereign or a guinea,[1] and the Merriam-Webster Unabridged also dates the word to 1661.[3] Barnhart dates it to 1688,[10] and Etymonline to the 1680s.[11]

Semantic evolution

The word was first thieves' cant: B.E.'s Dictionary of the Canting Crew (about 1698) has quidds for money, and Bailey and Grose repeated it in the 18th century.[13][1] Weekley notes that in the 17th century it meant a guinea, later a sovereign.[12] Once the sovereign gave way to paper money, it came to mean one pound sterling, and in Australia it was also used of the Australian pound.[1][5] The plural is usually quid.[7][5] The phrase quids in, in luck or in profit, is recorded from 1919,[1][5] and Australian and New Zealand slang has not the full quid for someone not very bright.[7][5]

Timeline

  • 1661 – plural, money; then a sovereign or a guinea.[1][13][3] Barnhart dates the word to 1688.[10]
  • c. 1698 – quidds, money, in thieves' cant.[13][1]
  • 1919 – quids in, in luck or profit.[1]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (British, informal) One pound sterling; plural usually quid: The ticket cost me twenty quid.[7][3][5]
  2. Formerly, a sovereign or a guinea.[1][5][3]
  3. quids in: (British, informal) in luck or in profit.[7][1][5]
  4. not the full quid: (Australia and New Zealand, informal) not very intelligent.[7][5]

quid2 piece of tobacco for chewing

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
1720 Charles Shadwell, The Sham Prince
Inherited from
Old English cwidu via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Proto-Germanic *kweduz

Etymology

The piece for chewing is a dialect variant of cud.[1][3][10][11][5][14][12][6] It is inherited from Middle English quide,[3][9] inherited from Old English cwidu, also cudu,[3][11][10][9] which meant both the cud and a gum or resin, such as mastic.[11][6][7] It goes back to Proto-Germanic *kweduz (“resin”),[11] the source also of Old High German quiti (“glue”), now Kitt (“putty”), and Old Norse kvaða (“resin”).[11][6][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

A small lump of something, especially tobacco, for chewing: 1720, in Charles Shadwell's play “The Sham Prince”.[1] Merriam-Webster also dates it to 1720,[3] while Barnhart and Etymonline give 1727, in Bailey's Dictionary.[10][11]

Semantic evolution

The OED notes that quid began as a form of cud and is now kept apart from it in the tobacco sense.[1] In many dialects, from Scotland to Kent, Somerset and Devon, quid (in Wiltshire and Somerset also queed) remained the ordinary word for the cud of cattle, as in chew the quid, and in Shropshire it was the pellet cast up by an owl;[15] the OED records the pellet sense from 1834.[1] The verb quid followed in 1759, for chewing tobacco or the cud.[1] From 1831 farriers used it of a horse that lets half-chewed food drop from its mouth, often a sign of bad teeth.[1][5]

Timeline

  • 1720 – a lump of tobacco or the like for chewing.[1][3]
  • 1759 – verb, to chew tobacco or the cud.[1]
  • 1831 – verb, of a horse, to let half-chewed food drop from the mouth.[1]
  • 1834 – a pellet cast up by a bird of prey.[1]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A piece of something to be chewed but not swallowed, especially a cut of chewing tobacco.[3][7][1]

Verb

  1. Of a horse, to let partly chewed food drop from the mouth.[3][1][5]
  2. To chew tobacco; of an animal, to chew the cud.[1][5]
  • cud
  • quiddity
  • quid pro quo

Usage notes

A third, learned quid, the essence of a thing, is the Latin word quid used as a noun (from 1576), and survives mainly beside quo in the sense of quid pro quo.[1][3]

References

  1. ^ 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 z 27 28 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  2. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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 Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  8. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  10. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  11. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  12. ^ a b c Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  13. ^ a b c d Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  14. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  15. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Quid.” Etymologically, 31 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/en/quid. Accessed 1 Nov. 2026.

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