Etymologically
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stomach

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈstʌm.ək/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English stomak, borrowed from Old French estomac, stomaque,[2][3][4] from Latin stomachus (“throat, gullet; stomach; taste, liking; pride, indignation”),[2][3] from Ancient Greek στόμαχος (stómakhos, “throat, gullet; opening”), from στόμα (stóma, “mouth”).[2][3][5] The native word is maw.[2] It is related to stoma.[2][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The internal pouch of the body in which food is digested: before 1325 in Barnhart, the early 14th century in Etymonline.[3][2]

Semantic evolution

The Latin word already had the figurative senses of courage, pride, indignation and ill will,[7] and they came into English too: appetite about 1386,[3] the seat of feelings in the 16th century, and courage, pride or anger, which Trench noted had nearly or quite gone by 1859.[5][7] The belly or abdomen is from about 1375.[8] The spelling of the ending was conformed to Latin from the 16th century, but the pronunciation stayed as in Middle English.[2][3] The verb at first meant to be offended at or resent (1523), echoing Latin stomachārī “to be angry”,[3][2] and the sense “to put up with, endure”, probably from digestion, is from the 1570s in Etymonline and 1677 in Barnhart.[2][3]

Timeline

  • a. 1325 – the digestive organ.[3]
  • c. 1375 – the belly.[8]
  • c. 1386 – appetite.[3]
  • 1523 – verb, to resent.[3]
  • 1570s – to tolerate.[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The organ in which food is stored and partly digested after being swallowed.
  2. The front of the body below the chest; the abdomen or belly.
  3. Desire or appetite: no stomach for a fight.

Verb

  1. To put up with or tolerate something unpleasant.
  2. (archaic) To resent.

Word family

  • stomachache
  • stomacher
  • stomachy
  • tummy
  • honey stomach
  • stomach pump
  • stomach sweetbread
  • stomach worm
  • stomachic
  • stoma
  • maw

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b Trench, Richard Chenevix (1859), A Select Glossary of English Words Used Formerly in Senses Different from Their Present, London: John W. Parker
  8. ^ a b Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press