Etymologically
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slayer

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 31 October 2026 at 15:24. This address is a permanent link to this version.
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Pronunciation

  • UK: /ˈsleɪə/[1]

Etymology

It is formed from English slay + -er,[2][3][4] in Middle English sleer, from the verb slēn (“to slay”) and the agent suffix.[5][6][3] The OED notes that the compound manslayer is found a little earlier, and compares Middle Dutch slager, Middle Low German slegere, Old High German slagari and German Schläger;[2] Etymonline glosses the German word "a beater, a mallet".[3] Old English had its own agent noun, slaga (“slayer, killer”).[3] The verb slay is from Old English slēan (“to strike, beat; to kill”),[3][7] from Proto-Germanic *slahaną (“to hit”).[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

One who kills, a killer or murderer: about 1380, in the works of Wyclif,[2] late in the 14th century in Etymonline.[3]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its sense since the 14th century, and the OED notes its use in figurative contexts as well.[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as "killer; murderer; destroyer", quoting Spenser's Faerie Queene: "The crowned often slain, the slayer crown'd".[4] In British teenage slang of the early 2000s a slayer was an assertive young woman, after the heroine of the television series “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”.[8]

Timeline

  • c. 1380 – one who slays or kills.[2][3]
  • 1755 – Johnson defines it as killer, murderer, destroyer.[4]
  • 2003 – British teenage slang, an assertive young woman.[8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A person or thing that slays; a killer: the knight remembered as the slayer of the giant.[5][2][4]
  2. (slang) An assertive young woman.[8]

Word family

  • self-slayer
  • manslayer

Usage notes

A slayer was also a worker who sets the warps in weaving, recorded from about 1881 and formed from a verb slay meaning to set warps;[2] the noun slay, a weaver's reed, is named from "striking" the web.[3]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c d Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  5. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
  7. ^ Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  8. ^ a b c Dalzell, Tom; Victor, Terry, eds. (2013), The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, 2nd ed., London: Routledge