surround

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English surounden (“to flood, overflow”),^[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman surounder, a variant of soronder or suronder (“to overflow, abound; to surpass, dominate”),^[5][2][6] from Late Latin superundō (“to overflow”),^[5][3][7] made of Latin super- (“over”) and undō (“to rise in waves”), from unda (“wave”).^[5][2][4] Etymonline and the American Heritage Dictionary trace the Latin noun to Proto-Indo-European *wed- (“water; wet”).^[2][4] The word has no etymological connection with round, but it was influenced by it in both form and meaning:^[8][9][10] the modern spelling was established before 1600.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

To overflow, flood or submerge: 1444, in the Rolls of Parliament.^[5][11] Barnhart dates the form surounden to 1423, and Etymonline to the early 15th century.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

The original sense lasted into the 17th century:^[8] Ayto quotes an Act of Parliament of 1609 noting that "the sea hath surrounded" land,^[8] and the OED records it as obsolete except in dialect.^[5][7] The sense "to enclose or encompass on all sides" is first recorded in John Bullokar's English Expositor (1616).^[5][3] Barnhart puts it down to the figurative French sense "to dominate" together with the likeness in sound to round,^[3][2] and Weekley to a mistaken association with round.^[12] The military sense, to enclose troops or a place so as to cut off retreat, followed in 1637,^[5] and the use of conditions or other immaterial things that surround someone in 1639.^[5] Johnson (1755) defined it as to environ, to encompass, to enclose on all sides, quoting Milton.^[13] The noun was first a hunting term, chiefly in the United States (1825), for driving wild animals into an enclosed place by surrounding them;^[5][10] it then meant a border of linoleum or felt round a carpet (1893) and the area around something (1922).^[5][7] In late 19th-century Australian slang to surround food or drink was to eat or drink it.^[14]

Timeline

• 1423 – surounden, to flood, in Barnhart's dating.^[3]
• 1444 – to overflow, inundate (now obsolete except in dialect).^[5]
• 1616 – to enclose on all sides, in Bullokar's English Expositor.^[5][3]
• 1637 – (military) to enclose a place or body of troops.^[5]
• 1638 – to travel round, circumnavigate (obsolete by 1825).^[5]
• 1688 – to extend round, as a frame or border.^[5]
• 1825 – noun, (US) a way of hunting by surrounding the animals.^[5][10]
• 1893 – noun, a border, as round a carpet.^[5]
• 1922 – noun, the surrounding area; the environment.^[5]

Modern meaning

Verb

1. To be or lie on every side of something; to encircle or enclose: Tall hedges surround the garden.
2. To place soldiers or police on all sides of a place or group, cutting off escape or access.
3. To be present around a person as part of their life or circle: He is surrounded by people who flatter him.
4. To cause something to be enclosed by something else: They surrounded the pool with a low wall.
5. (obsolete) To overflow or flood.

Noun

1. (chiefly British) A border or edging round something, such as the uncovered floor between a carpet and the walls.
2. The area or setting around something; its surroundings.
3. (chiefly US) A method of hunting wild animals by encircling them and driving them into a place from which they cannot escape.

Word family

• surround sound
• surroundings

Related words

• abound
• redound
• undulate
• inundate

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ 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
6. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
9. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
12. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com