school

Pronunciation

• IPA: /skuːl/^[1][2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English scole, inherited from Old English scōl (“institution for instruction”),^[3][4] borrowed from Latin schola (“leisure for learning; lecture; school”),^[3][5] from Ancient Greek σχολή (skholḗ, “spare time, leisure; learned discussion; lecture place”),^[3][6] originally “a holding back, a keeping clear”, from σχεῖν (skheîn, “to get”) (compare ἔχειν (ékhein, “to have, hold”)),^[3][7] from Proto-Indo-European *segh- (“to hold”).^[3][8] In Middle English it was reinforced by Old French escole.^[9][10] The Latin word was borrowed widely, giving also French école and German Schule.^[3][11]

School, a group of fish, is a different word: it is inherited from Middle English scole, borrowed from Middle Dutch schole (“troop, multitude”), related to Old English scolu (“troop, crowd of fish”) and to shoal,^[12][13][3] and Etymonline suggests a root meaning “to cut”, as in a division.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A place for instruction (Old English scōl, before 899, in Alfred's translation of Bede's Ecclesiastical History).^[7]

Semantic evolution

The basic sense of the Greek word was “leisure”, which passed to the learned discussion that was the proper use of free time, and then to the place where it was held;^[3][13] Merriam-Webster's Word Histories dates the first use of skholḗ for a place of learning to about 30 BC.^[13] The Romans borrowed it as schola and employed Greek slaves as teachers, and Christian missionaries later spread schools across Europe.^[13] In English it replaced Old English lārhūs, “lore-house”.^[11] The meaning “students attending a school” is attested from about 1300, and the school building by the 1590s.^[3] The sense of a group united by similar principles or methods, first recorded in Bacon's Essays (1612), gave school of thought (by 1848).^[7][3] The verb first meant “to study at a university” (about 1425) and then “to teach” (about 1445),^[7] and since the 1570s “to train or discipline strictly”.^[3] In the United States school has meant a college or university since 1701.^[14] In Australia a school was a group of gamblers, especially at two-up, from 1812.^[15][14] South African English uses school of an African person educated at a mission school, and to school, to attend school.^[16]

Timeline

• before 899 – Old English scōl.^[7]
• c. 1300 – the students of a school.^[3]
• c. 1400 – a group of fish (a separate word).^[12]
• c. 1425 – verb, to study at a university.^[7]
• c. 1445 – verb, to teach.^[7]
• 1590s – the school building.^[3]
• 1612 – a group with similar principles or methods.^[7]
• 1701 – a college or university (US).^[14]
• 1848 – school of thought.^[3]
• 1870 – school of hard knocks.^[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. An institution for educating children.
2. An institution for instruction in a particular skill or subject: a dancing school.
3. (North America) A college or university; a faculty of a university: law school.
4. The pupils and staff of a school; its building; the time spent there: after school.
5. A group of artists, writers or thinkers sharing a style, method or doctrine.
6. A large group of fish or sea mammals swimming together; a shoal.

Verb

1. To educate at a school.
2. To train or discipline: schooled herself to accept it.
3. Of fish, to swim in a school.

Adjective

1. Of or relating to a school or to education.

Word family

• schoolable
• schoolless
• schoollike
• schooling

Related words

• scholar
• scholastic
• scheme
• shoal

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
5. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
9. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
12. ^ a b Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
13. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
14. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
15. ^ Dalzell, Tom; Victor, Terry, eds. (2013), The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, 2nd ed., London: Routledge
16. ^ A Dictionary of South African English on Historical Principles, Dictionary Unit for South African English, https://dsae.co.za