Etymologically
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specimen

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈspɛsɪmɪn/[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin specimen (“mark, sign, evidence, example, pattern; outward appearance”),[2][3][4][5] from speciō (“to look at”) and the noun suffix -men, which denotes a result or means.[2][5][6] The Latin verb comes from Proto-Indo-European *spek- (“to observe”),[3][7] and species is from the same verb.[8][3] The OED notes that the English word was in turn borrowed widely in Europe: French spécimen is recorded from 1662, Spanish espécimen from 1683 and Italian specimen from before 1755.[2] The Latin plural was also fairly common in English in the later 17th century.[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

An example or instance from which the character of the whole can be judged: 1604, in Bishop W. Barlow's account of the conference at Hampton Court.[2] Other dictionaries date the word later: Etymonline and Merriam-Webster to 1610, in the sense "pattern, model" or "means of finding out",[3][9] and Barnhart to 1619.[4]

Semantic evolution

In the 17th century the word had several senses now obsolete: a means of finding out, an experiment (1610–1800), a pattern or model (1632–97) and a rough draft or outline (1664–1881).[2][4] The sense that prevailed, a single thing regarded as typical of its class, appears in 1648,[2] by the 1650s according to Etymonline and Barnhart.[3][4] From 1665 it was used of an animal, plant or mineral kept for scientific study,[2] and in 1742 in medicine of a sample of urine, blood or tissue.[2] Applied to people, it meant first a typical example of a human quality (1678), and then a person of a certain sort (1746), often with a disparaging adjective, a queer specimen, from 1839.[2][10] Charles Lamb complained in 1808 that books of Specimens of poets and prose writers had become fashionable, replacing the older Beauties.[3] In Australia and New Zealand a specimen was a piece of quartz with visible gold (1849).[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as a sample, a part of anything shown so that the rest may be known.[11]

Timeline

  • 1604 – an example from which the whole can be judged.[2]
  • 1610 – a means of finding out, an experiment (obsolete).[2][4]
  • 1632 – a pattern or model (obsolete).[2]
  • 1648 – a single thing typical of its class.[2]
  • 1665 – a plant, animal or mineral kept for study.[2]
  • 1742 – medicine, a sample of urine, blood or tissue.[2]
  • 1746 – with an adjective, a person of a certain kind.[2]
  • 1849 – Australia and New Zealand, quartz showing gold.[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A single thing or part regarded as typical of its group or class; an example or sample.
  2. (medicine) A sample of tissue, blood, urine or the like taken for testing or diagnosis.
  3. A plant, animal, rock or part of one kept for scientific study or display: The museum keeps thousands of beetle specimens.
  4. (informal) A person of a particular kind, often said disparagingly: He's an odd specimen.

Adjective

  1. Serving as a sample: a specimen page.

Word family

  • type specimen

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 q r s Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  6. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  8. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  9. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  10. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.