Etymologically
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tome

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Pronunciation

  • /təʊm/, /toʊm/[1]

Etymology

Most dictionaries take it as borrowed from Middle French tome,[2][3][4][5][6] and Etymonline allows it to come directly from Latin;[7] the OED, revised in 2018, treats it as borrowed from Latin a borrowing from Latin and only compares French tome, recorded from before 1544.[8] In classical Latin tomus was a piece or length of papyrus, and in later Latin also a roll, a volume or book (4th century) and a synodical or papal letter.[8] It is from Ancient Greek τόμος (tómos, “slice, piece cut off”), which in Hellenistic Greek also meant a roll of papyrus, a volume or a section of a book,[8][7][2] an o-grade form from the base of τέμνω (témnō, “to cut”),[8][2] from Proto-Indo-European *tem- (“to cut”).[7][2][9] Ayto notes that the same root gave temple, tonsorial, tonsure and -tomy.[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

One of the separate volumes of a book, or one of the largest sections of a single volume: 1519, in William Horman's Vulgaria.[8][2][3]

Semantic evolution

Ayto describes the Greek word's passage from a slice or piece to a cut roll of papyrus and finally a volume or book.[6] In English the general sense "a book" is recorded from about 1570 or 1573,[8][2][7] and the word came to mean especially a large, heavy or scholarly book,[8][3] now often implying one that is ponderous and old-fashioned;[7] the OED calls the word archaic and humorous in this use.[8] The original sense, one volume of a larger work, became rare,[8] and the Shorter Oxford treats it as obsolete by the mid 18th century.[10] Johnson (1755) still gave both senses, "one volume of many" and "a book".[11] From 1610 tome was also used figuratively, as in the tome of nature or memory, for a notional book that records something,[8] and in church history from 1624 for a papal letter.[8]

Timeline

  • 1519 – one of the volumes of a larger work.[8][2][3]
  • c. 1570 – a book, later especially a large and heavy one.[8] Barnhart dates this sense to 1573.[2]
  • 1610 – figurative, a notional book recording something.[8]
  • 1624 – in church history, a papal letter.[8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A book, especially a large, heavy or scholarly one: a weighty medical tome.[5][3][8]
  2. One of the volumes of a larger work.[5][3][8]

Word family

  • microtome

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  6. ^ a b c Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  7. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  10. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.