spate

Etymology

It is a Middle English word, originally Scottish and northern English, of unknown origin.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7]} The OED notes that the early spellings and rhymes show an original long “a”, which later changed regularly to the “ea” of dialect spellings.^[2] Etymonline and Klein suggest that it may come from Old French espoit (“flood”), from Dutch spuiten (“to flow, spout”), which is related to spout;^[3][8] Skeat derived it in the same way, through an Anglo-Norman form,^[9] and Partridge took it as perhaps a shortening of Middle French espoit (“gushing of a spring”).^[10] The Middle English Dictionary compares only the modern dialect word.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

A flood or sudden rising of a river: about 1425, in Andrew of Wyntoun's Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland.^[2][12] Barnhart dates it about 1425 and Etymonline to the mid-15th century,^[13][3] and the Middle English Dictionary's first quotation, from the Alphabet of Tales of about 1450, tells of a river that rose in a great flood and covered the fields.^[11]

Semantic evolution

From the river in flood the word spread to the swollen state of water itself: Gavin Douglas's translation of the Aeneid (1513) has it without an article and in the phrase in spate, in flood.^[2] By 1727 it could mean a sudden heavy downpour of rain, a sense chiefly Scottish.^[2][4][14] The figurative sense, a sudden outburst or outpouring of feeling, words or events, is recorded from about 1614,^[2][13] and it is this sense, often "a large number" (a spate of burglaries), that spread beyond Scotland.^[14][6] In the dialects of Scotland and northern England the word was spelled spait, speat, spete and speet, and meant both a flood and a downpour of rain.^[15] A verb, to flood or to rain heavily, is recorded from 1853.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1425 – a flood, especially a sudden rising of a river.^[2][13]
• 1513 – in spate, in flood; also flooding in general.^[2]
• c. 1614 – a sudden outburst or outpouring of words, feeling or events.^[2][13][3]
• 1727 – a sudden heavy downpour of rain.^[2]
• 1853 – verb, to flood; to rain heavily.^[2]
• 1884 – the broken water of a river in flood (rare).^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A large number or amount of similar things coming close together: a spate of new cafés along the high street.^[14][6]
2. A sudden outburst or rush: a spate of angry letters.^[14][6][2]
3. (chiefly British) A sudden flood in a river or stream, especially after heavy rain or melting snow, as in the phrase in spate.^[6][14][2]
4. (chiefly British) A sudden heavy downpour of rain.^[6][14]

Verb

1. (chiefly Scottish) To flood.^[14][2]

Related words

• spout

Usage notes

Collins labels the senses "flood" and "downpour" chiefly British, while the sense "a large number" is general.^[6] The word was long current in the dialects of Scotland and northern England, from Shetland to Lancashire.^[15]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
11. ^ a b 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)
12. ^ Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
13. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
14. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
15. ^ 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)