Etymologically
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rabbit

Etymology and origin of the English word rabbit

History Permalink
Confidence
Uncertain
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
before 1398
From
Middle English rabet

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈɹæbət/; /ˈɹæbɪt/ (UK)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English rabet, rabbete, probably from a dialectal French source, compare modern French dialect rabotte, young rabbit, and Walloon robète,[2][3][4][5] a diminutive of Flemish or Middle Dutch robbe, rabbit, which is of unknown or uncertain origin.[3][2][5] Liberman calls it a Germanic noun with a French suffix:[6][3] Germanic makes wide use of the root r-b in naming animals, as German Robbe, seal, and Flemish rabbe, robbe, rabbit, and the Walloon word need not be the source.[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The young of the coney: before 1398, in Trevisa's translation of Bartholomaeus.[2][7][3]

Semantic evolution

At first the word meant the young animal only; the adult was called a coney until the 18th century.[2][3][8] Rabbits were brought to Britain by the Normans in the 12th century for meat and fur.[8] Middle English rabet was a word mainly of French cuisine.[6] Pulling a rabbit out of a hat as a conjuring trick is recorded by 1843,[3] the rabbit's foot as a good-luck charm by 1879,[3] and the rabbit punch to the back of the neck from 1915.[3] Rabbits or white rabbits, said for luck on the first day of the month, is from 1920.[7] In British informal use, a poor player at a game is a rabbit,[9] and to rabbit on, to chatter, is from the rhyming slang rabbit and pork, talk.[5][9]

Timeline

  • before 1398 – a young rabbit.[2]
  • 1843 – a rabbit out of a hat.[3]
  • 1879 – rabbit's foot.[3]
  • 1915 – rabbit punch.[3]
  • 1920 – white rabbits.[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. Any of various long-eared, short-tailed burrowing mammals of the family Leporidae.
  2. The fur of a rabbit or hare.
  3. A runner who sets a fast pace for others in a race.
  4. (British, informal) A poor performer at a game or sport.

Verb

  1. To hunt rabbits.
  2. (British, informal, often with on) To talk at length about trivial things.

Word family

  • rabbiter
  • rabbity
  • rabbitlike
  • coney
  • hare
  • bunny
  • rarebit

Usage notes

Mencken notes that the word is rarely heard in American speech and is mostly applied to the so-called Belgian hare, which is in fact a rabbit.[3]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ a b c Liberman, Anatoly (2008), An Analytic Dictionary of English Etymology: An Introduction, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
  7. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
Cite this entry

“Rabbit.” Etymologically, 17 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/en/rabbit. Accessed 17 Oct. 2026.

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