rink

Etymology

It is first recorded in Scots, as renk and rinc,^[2][3][4] probably borrowed from Old French renc, also reng, a row or line,^{[5][2][6][7][8]} the source of rank;^[2][6][7][9] the OED and Merriam-Webster name the source as Middle French, the OED with the sense "space for jousting".^[10][3] The Shorter Oxford calls the origin uncertain,^[11] and the American Heritage Dictionary only possible.^[12] The French word is from Frankish *hring or another Germanic source,^[5][2] from Proto-Germanic *hringaz (“something curved, circle”), from a nasalized form of Proto-Indo-European *sker- (“to turn, bend”).^[5][12] Etymonline thinks it was much confused in meaning with ring, which was also used for an area marked out for a contest, and Barnhart suggests that it may even derive from ring in that sense, recorded from 1303 in Mannyng's “Handlyng Synne”;^[5][2] Skeat took it as a form of ring.^[13] Weekley compares Italian arringo (“tilting-ground”).^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The ground marked out for a combat, joust or race: about 1375, in Barbour's “The Bruce”, in Scots;^[2][5] the OED's quotation is from a 1489 manuscript of the poem.^[10]

Semantic evolution

Until the mid-19th century the word was used only in Scotland, and its first use outside Scotland was in curling;^[10][5] Word Origins says that in medieval Scotland it was jousting knights, not skaters, who took to a rink.^[14] In early Scots it also meant the course a person follows, as in to run one's rink (from before 1500 to 1871), a bout in a tournament (1508–1827) and the action of running (before 1522 to 1596).^[10] Burns used it in 1787 for a stretch of ice marked out for curling,^[10][2][5] and since 1776 a rink has also been a team of players in curling or quoits,^[10] later in bowls (1864), where it also named a strip of the green.^[10] Barnhart dates the sense "sheet of ice for skating" to 1867 and artificially prepared rinks to about 1879;^[2] the OED has the skating sense from 1848, a hall built to house a rink from 1861 and a floor for roller skating from 1871.^[10] Etymonline dates roller-skating floors to 1875, the building to 1895 and ice hockey rinks to 1896, and notes the Latinate glaciarium (1876) for an ice rink.^[5] In Scots dialect a rink was also a race or course, and a straight line, especially the border between England and Scotland.^[15]

Timeline

• c. 1375 – Scots renk, ground marked out for a contest (Barbour).^[2]
• before 1500 – the course one follows.^[10]
• 1508 – a bout in a joust or tournament.^[10]
• 1776 – a team in curling or quoits.^[10]
• 1787 – a stretch of ice marked out for curling (Burns).^[10][2]
• 1848 – a sheet of ice for skating.^[10]
• 1861 – a building that houses a rink.^[10]
• 1864 – a strip of a bowling green; a team in bowls.^[10]
• 1871 – a floor for roller skating.^[10]
• 1877 – verb, to skate on a rink.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. An area of ice for skating, especially an artificial, covered one: The town floods the park to make a rink in winter.^[6][3][11]
2. A smooth floor for roller skating.^[6][3][11]
3. A building containing an ice or roller rink.^[6][3][11]
4. A marked stretch of ice for curling or ice hockey.^[3][6][10]
5. (bowls) A strip of a bowling green on which a match is played.^[6][3][11]
6. A team of players in bowls or curling, usually four.^[6][3][11]
7. (obsolete, 1489–1572) In Scotland, ground set apart for a joust, combat or race.^[10][11]

Verb

1. To skate on or as if on a rink.^[3][11][10]

Word family

• rink rat
• roller rink

Related words

• rank
• ring
• range

Usage notes

The OED treats as a separate word an obsolete rink, a man or warrior, used from Old English to 1600 and cognate with Old Saxon rink and Old High German rinc.^[10]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
9. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e f g h Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
13. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
14. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University 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)