Etymologically
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thigh

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English thigh, also thih and thẹ̄gh,[2][3][4] inherited from Old English þēoh, also þīoh, with the Anglian form þēh,[5][6][7] from Proto-Germanic *þeuhą.[7][8] Its cognates are Old Frisian thiāch, Old Dutch thio, Dutch dij, Old High German dioh and Old Norse þjó (“thigh, rump”).[5][7][3][4] The OED and Hoad trace the Germanic word to an Indo-European series Proto-Indo-European *teuk-, also seen in Lithuanian táukas (“fat”) and Old Irish tón (“rump, buttocks”);[5][6][4] Etymonline, following Watkins, takes it as probably the thick or fat part of the leg, from a root meaning "to swell".[7][9] Ayto likewise calls the thigh etymologically the "plump" part of the leg,[10] and Klein relates it to Latin tumeō (“to swell”), the source of tumid.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The upper part of the human leg, from the hip to the knee: recorded in Old English, first in the Corpus Glossary,[5] before 800 according to Barnhart.[3] Bosworth–Toller cites it glossing Latin coxa and femur.[11]

Semantic evolution

The regular Middle English descendant of Old English þēoh was þeh, which survives as thee in Scots and northern dialect; in the 12th and 13th centuries þeȝ narrowed to þiȝ, giving thigh, just as heȝ and neȝ became high and nigh.[5] Barnhart finds thih probably before 1200, in Layamon's Chronicle of Britain.[3] From about 1300 the word was used of the corresponding part of an animal's hind leg;[5] about 1440 it was transferred to things such as the stem of a plant, the lower trunk of a tree or the lower slopes of a mountain.[5] In 16th-century Scotland it also named the part of a garment that covers the thigh.[5] The compound thighbone, the femur, dates from the mid-15th century.[7] Johnson (1755) defined the thigh as everything between the buttocks and the knee.[12] A verb thigh, to carve a small bird, was used from about 1478 to 1767.[5]

Timeline

  • before 800 – Old English þēoh, the upper part of the human leg.[3][5]
  • before 1200 – Middle English thih, in Layamon.[3]
  • before 1300 – the corresponding part of an animal's hind leg.[5]
  • c. 1440 – transferred to the stem of a plant, the trunk of a tree or the lower slopes of a mountain.[5]
  • mid-15th century – thighbone.[7]
  • c. 1478 – verb, to carve a small bird (obsolete by 1767).[5]
  • 1533 – the part of a garment covering the thigh (Scotland, obsolete).[5]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The upper part of the human leg, between the hip and the knee: She bruised her thigh on the table edge.
  2. The corresponding part of the hind limb in other vertebrates, and a similar part in insects.
  3. In a bird or a hoofed animal, the segment of the leg just below the true thigh, which is hidden by feathers or skin.

Word family

  • thighed
  • thighbone
  • thigh-high
  • thigh-slapper

Usage notes

Collins gives crural and femoral as the related adjectives.[13] The biblical phrase smite hip and thigh means to overthrow completely.[14]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ 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)
  3. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  8. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  10. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  11. ^ Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  13. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  14. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press