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smelt

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Etymology and origin of the English word smelt

Pronunciation

smelt1 small fish

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
800 before 800, Corpus Glossary
Inherited from
Old English smelt via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Proto-Germanic *smeltaz

Etymology

The fish is inherited from Middle English smelt, also smelte,[2][3] inherited from Old English smelt, also smylt,[4][5][6][7] from Proto-Germanic *smeltaz.[1][8] Medieval writers in England latinised it as Medieval Latin smeltus and smyltus.[6] It is cognate with Dutch smelt (“sand eel”), Danish smelt and Norwegian smelta (“a small cod or whiting”),[4][9][10] and the dictionaries call the set of fish names obscurely related.[7][6] Orel derives the noun from the Germanic verb that gave smelt2,[8] and Klein thinks the fish was named for its soft flesh,[10] while Etymonline cites Watkins for Proto-Indo-European *mel- (“soft”) and the Century Dictionary for a guess at smylte (“serene, smooth”).[11] The OED calls any link with smolt and that adjective very doubtful,[4] although Hoad and the Shorter Oxford compare that fish name.[7][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A small sea fish: Barnhart dates the word before 800,[9] and the OED's first record is in the Old English Corpus Glossary.[4] Old English glosses match it with Latin sardīna, and Clark Hall glosses it "sardine".[5][12]

Semantic evolution

The name stayed with Osmerus eperlanus, a salmon-like fish that the OED notes for its peculiar odour, though Etymonline points out that the OED draws no link with smell.[4][11] Middle English also used it more loosely for a small or young fish, and as a surname.[2] Johnson (1755) simply calls it a small sea fish.[13] From 1776 it was applied to other small fishes, in the south of England especially the sand smelt,[4] and since 1836 to the American species.[4] Northern dialect used it for a smolt,[4][6] and the English Dialect Dictionary records it for the fry of salmon in Scotland and Lancashire, and for a child, as a term of contempt, in Banffshire.[14] A simpleton could be a smelt from 1607 to 1640, as in Dekker and Webster's West-ward Hoe,[4] and the word turns up again for well-dressed fools in a flash dictionary of about 1850.[15]

Timeline

  • before 800 – a small sea fish.[9][4]
  • 1607 – a simpleton (obsolete by 1640).[4]
  • before 1634 – in northern dialect, a smolt.[4]
  • 1776 – other small fishes, especially the sand smelt.[4]
  • 1836 – a related American species.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A small silvery food fish of the family Osmeridae, especially the European Osmerus eperlanus, which lives on coasts and enters rivers to spawn.[3][4][6]
  2. Any of various other small fishes, such as the atherine.[4]
  3. (dialect) A smolt.[4][6]
  4. (obsolete, 1607–1640) A simpleton.[4][15]

smelt2 to melt ore

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1543
Borrowed from
Middle Dutch smelten
Ultimate origin
Proto-Indo-European *smeld-

Etymology

The verb meaning to melt ore is probably borrowed from Middle Dutch smelten or Middle Low German smelten,[4][3][6][7][16] and Barnhart thinks the Low German source the more likely,[9] from Proto-Germanic *smeltaną.[1][17] It is related to smälta, smelta and smelte, which the OED takes from the same Dutch or Low German word, and to Old High German smelzan and German schmelzen.[4][9] The base is commonly treated as a variant of the one in melt,[4][7][6] and Etymonline traces it to Proto-Indo-European *smeld-, a variant of Proto-Indo-European *mel- (“soft”).[11] Kroonen instead compares Ancient Greek μέλδω (méldō, “to cause to melt”) and argues that the two Germanic verbs were associated only later, the Indo-European roots still being distinct.[17]

Earliest recorded meaning

To fuse ore so as to extract the metal: 1543, in a record of Fountains Abbey.[4][9][3] The verb is implied earlier in the Middle English occupational noun smelter, one who smelts ore, found as smeltar in 1455, and as a surname about 1382.[2][9] Etymonline therefore dates the word to the late 14th century.[11]

Semantic evolution

The meaning has stayed close to its first use: the OED has one sense, covering both the ore that is fused and the metal obtained.[4] Johnson (1755) gives "to melt oar, so as to extract the metal", deriving the word from Icelandic and Dutch.[13] Dialects stretched it: in Cheshire to smelt was to run lime through a sieve for mortar, and in West Yorkshire to spend money on drink.[14] Etymonline adds that smalto (“enamel”) is from a Germanic word of the same family.[11]

Timeline

  • c. 1382 – Smelter as a surname.[2][9]
  • 1455 – smeltar, one who smelts ore.[2][9]
  • 1543 – to fuse ore to extract the metal.[4][9][3]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To melt or fuse ore in order to extract the metal, or to obtain metal in this way: The works smelted copper from ore shipped up the river.[4][18][3]

Noun

  1. A product of smelting.[3]

Word family

  • smelter
  • smeltery
  • unsmelted

Usage notes

Smelt is also the past tense and past participle of smell, as Johnson already records.[13][19] A separate slang noun smelt, a half-guinea, is recorded from 1635 to 1688 in the OED, and is of unknown origin.[4][3][15]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b c d e Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  10. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  11. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  12. ^ Clark Hall, J. R. (1960), A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 4th ed., with a supplement by H. D. Meritt, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  13. ^ a b c Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  14. ^ a b 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)
  15. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  16. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  17. ^ a b Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  18. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  19. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul

Related etymologies

  • golf · also from Middle Dutch
  • grab · also from Middle Dutch
  • kit · also from Middle Dutch
  • clock · also from Middle Dutch
  • deck · also from Middle Dutch
  • hop · also from Middle Dutch
  • cant · also from Middle Dutch
  • brick · also from Middle Dutch
Cite this entry

“Smelt.” Etymologically, 5 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/smelt. Accessed 5 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·