shrimp

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English shrimpe,^[2][3][4] probably a Germanic word related to Old English scrimman (“to shrink, dry up”)^[2][5][6] and to Middle High German schrimpfen (“to contract”),^[7][8][9] Middle Low German schrempen (“to contract, wrinkle”)^[8][10] and Old Norse skreppa (“thin person”).^[2][3] The American Heritage Dictionary suggests a Low German origin.^[4] Barnhart and Etymonline see a shared notion of thinness, comparing Danish dialect skrimpe (“thin cattle”);^[3][2] the word is also related to scrimp and shrink.^[5][7][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The slender, long-tailed crustacean: 1327, in a wardrobe account of Edward II.^[7][3]

Semantic evolution

The sense "puny person" appears almost at once, in Chaucer's Monk's Prologue (c. 1386), where the Host says that ordinary men are mere shrimps beside monks;^[7][12] the OED thinks it comes directly from the root sense "shrunken creature" and is only now felt to be a transfer from the animal.^[7][13] Shakespeare's Talbot is a "weak and writhled shrimp" in 1 Henry VI,^[14][12] and Johnson (1755) gave both senses, the second as "a little wrinkled man; a dwarf".^[14] The colour of a cooked shrimp, a bright pink, is shrimp from 1895.^[7] A verb, to fish for shrimps, is recorded from 1801 in shrimping^[2] and in the OED from 1844.^[7]

Timeline

• 1327 – the crustacean.^[7][3]
• c. 1386 – a puny person (Chaucer).^[7][12]
• 1801 – shrimping, fishing for shrimps.^[2]
• 1844 – the verb, to fish for shrimps.^[7]
• 1895 – a bright pink colour.^[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A small, chiefly marine crustacean with a slender body and long tail, many kinds of which are eaten.
2. (chiefly US) The flesh of such animals as food.
3. (informal, derogatory) A small, slight or unimportant person: He was a shrimp of a boy at twelve.
4. A bright pink colour.

Verb

1. To fish for or catch shrimps.

Word family

• shrimper
• shrimplike
• shrimpy
• shrimpfish
• brine shrimp
• fairy shrimp
• ghost shrimp
• mantis shrimp

Related words

• scrimp
• shrink
• shrivel
• prawn

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
13. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.