stretch

Pronunciation

• IPA: /stretʃ/^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English strecchen, inherited from Old English streccan (“to stretch out, prostrate”),^[2][3][4] from Proto-Germanic *strakjaną,^[2][3] which also gave Dutch strekken and German strecken.^[2][3][4] It is related to German strack “taut” and, according to Barnhart, to Russian strogij “strict”;^[3] Etymonline suggests a link with the root of stark or with PIE Proto-Indo-European *strenk- (“tight, narrow”) (see string),^[2] and Hoad calls the origin uncertain.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

To prostrate oneself, or extend one's limbs lying down: about 900 in the OED; before 899 in Barnhart, in Alfred's translation of Bede.^[5][3]

Semantic evolution

To extend the arms or wings is from about 1200, and to lay out a dead body from the early 13th century.^[2][5] Straining something too far, at first as a torture, is from the early 13th century,^[2] and pulling taut or lengthening by force from the late 14th.^[2] The noun meant an expanse of land from about 1175,^[3][2] an act of stretching from 1541 (exaggeration in the 1540s),^[3][2] an unbroken period of some activity from 1661,^[3][2] and stretching the limbs from weariness from 1712, in Steele.^[3][2] A term in prison is thieves' slang from 1821,^[2] and the straight of a racecourse, as in home stretch, is by 1838.^[2] The stretch limo is a late 20th-century term.^[1][6]

Timeline

• c. 900 – to lie at full length.^[5]
• c. 1175 – an expanse of land.^[3]
• early 13th century – to strain too far.^[2]
• 1541 – an act of stretching.^[3]
• 1661 – an unbroken period.^[3]
• 1821 – a prison term (slang).^[2]
• 1838 – a racecourse straight.^[2]

Modern meaning

Verb

1. To make or become longer or wider by pulling.
2. To extend one's body or limbs to full length.
3. To extend over an area or period: the desert stretches for miles.
4. To make something go further than it should; to strain or exaggerate.

Noun

1. A continuous area or length: a stretch of road.
2. A continuous period of time.
3. An act of stretching the body.
4. (slang) A term in prison.

Word family

• stretchability
• stretchable
• stretchy
• prestretch
• backstretch
• outstretch
• overstretch
• stretchout

Related words

• stretcher
• straight
• stark
• string

References

1. ^ a b 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 k l m n o p Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster